I invite you to take five minutes from feeling harassed by the news or our own hectic heads for "Sonata for Piano & West Virginia No. 1." It offers another way of looking at West Virginia and those parts that remain uncorrupted, fresh, and true.
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MAKEITSHORT: Three Not-the-News, Under-a-Minute Videos
When you are suffering from an overdose of dire news, may we suggest spending a minute with a happy dog tooling down the road, a koto-fueled Japanese fire, and bird upon a Buddha's head?
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MUSIC VIDEO | An “Over the Rainbow” Primer and Duet
"Let the boys have the damn song." How "Over the Rainbow" almost didn't make the cut for "The Wizard of Oz." A look back at a "sacred" song in the American canon, on the occasion of creation of a down-and-dirty music video version.
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OP-ED LIMERICKS: “Toady,” “Move Quickly,”“Fauci,” & “ Canary Meet Coal Mine”
When all else fails in trying to understand the current American political regime, there's always the art of the Op-Ed Limerick. A new collection of four recent animations.
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IT’S A LAMB THING: Sheepish Thanks to an Old Friend
I spent the day before my birthday making a ridiculous music video that shows only lambs, sheeps and rams for three minutes. Here's why
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SONGS of COMFORT, SONGS of HOME: “Bring Sunshine When You Come”
A song for families that have lost someone in this pandemic. And for the many people putting their lives on the line to save our lives, plus the helpers who run to the disaster, instead of away May all see sunshine soon.
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SONGS of COMFORT, SONGS of HOME: May John Prine Awake in ‘Paradise’
John Prine has passed on. Here's a video homage to one of America's greatest singer-songwriters—a video version of his tune "Paradise." May he awaken in his paradise.
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OP-ED LIMERICKS: “Fauci,” “Mother Jones,” & “To Be Kind”
I am doing my bit to man the barricades by helping to Illustrate the op-ed limericks by a sister-in-arms in West Virginia. Baby Trump balloons feature prominently.
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“TAKING TO WING”: A Pandemic Diversion
If you can't fly away from the Covid-19 pandemic, take this diversion into the skies, set to a 4th grade flute thingie, two guitars, and a whole lot of birds.
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SONGS OF COMFORT, SONGS OF HOME: “Till There Was You”
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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“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: 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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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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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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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.
