reality check

So it turns out that eight months later - I don't really have time for a hobby like a three-hour, weekly, early morning radio shift.  (kind of like how I don't have time to update this blog often enough.) This past Wednesday's gallopinging show on CHIRPradio.org was my last. I'm not surprised, but yeh, disappointed it didn't work out. But because I can't quite let all the way go...an experiment: gallopinging v.2. Choosing a weekly song must be manageable....right? Enjoy.

Way into The Way Out

Q: You know how sometimes you hear a record, and you've been waiting a long time for it (along with a lot of other people), and you know you'll eventually be familiar with every single second of that record, and that listening will be like wearing your favorite v-neck sweater and cords on a brisk fall evening walk WITH steaming hot cocoa in one hand and your beloved's hand in the other, and that in the meantime you're just enjoying the accumulation of listens, the getting to know the record, the learning the songs in your ears and fingertips (for tapping along) and there's that one track that almost makes you cry, and the other that just makes you laugh - wait there are a few of those - and you know the musicians have given it their all (and we're talking about some generous people here), and it's just something you'd like to share with everyone you encounter?

A: Thanks, the Books!

P.S. I may have mentioned at some point during the past - oh - seven months, the TCF's collaboration with the Books, and our 2010 ShortDocs Challenge - Book Odds. Well the deadline's passed, the final tally is tallied, and a whopping 143 submissions were sent from 14 countries. Success! Beyond our hopes and expectations, to be honest. Have a listen - believe me you there are some GEMS in there. For real.

WLD

Well now. There's barely time to think and write and eat and breathe and pedal and rest and read and correspond and explore and relax and remember and extend and accept and wish-hope, still, and prepare and dig and smooth and clear and slice and carry and translate and and puzzle and scrub and cringe and laugh.

This is constant now, this barely time. But today, of all days - find time for listening, please? I'll do the same.

(Puzzle pieces spotted in alley behind friend's apartment in Pilsen. The kind of thing you stumble upon, and everything changes. Click for a good look, and to spot the lucky paperclip.)

appreciating appreciation

Am inspired sometimes by gesture, and sincerity, and clarity of purpose - all of which flows in abundance, in Rick Moody's recent blog post about Jolie Holland's song "Mexican Blue" which he's declared the best song of the millennium. I can only agree it's kind of a miracle song, and am grateful to have been taken deeper in, and for his making the case for making the case for something that resonates so very, very deeply. I hear the song differently now, and may hear every song differently now. Thanks, RM.

Was also charmed just yesterday, sitting and watching my fella's band play at a city festival, when the young kid next to me politely tapped me on the shoulder, and asked if I had a pen he could buy for $1. Genuinely curious, I asked him what it was for, as I began digging around in my bag. "I love this band so much, and I brought a CD for them all to sign. But I don't have anything to write with." I declined the dollar despite his best attempts to lay it on me,  handed over the pen, and turned attention back to the band. Kid started snacking on some Cheerios, we both continued to thoroughly enjoy the set. It was the sweetest moment.

All of this by way of saying...it's so good, so restorative, to collide with people / moments that express an abiding connection to someone, or something, or somehow. All of this by way of saying the appreciation is appreciated.

Steppin' Out in Ireland

Last week I had the great honor of spending a few days with Irish artists and radio producers.  I'd been invited over to Dublin by the independent Irish producer organization AIRPI, to talk about my own background in radio, the Third Coast Festival, the American radio landscape, and to hear some of their work. While I was there I got to meet with a bunch of Fringe Festival artists too. It was a short trip, but a full one. A very full one. A very short, full, and excellent trip. Read on for proof/highlights:

1. Talking to the 70 aforementioned Fringe Festival artists who came out to learn about the Dublin Fringe Festival's RADIOACTIVE collaboration with RTE (sort of like Ireland's NPR, except...it's actually supported by the government.) Basically non-radio folks will try their hand at making short radio stories, which will then air on RTE's digital channel. I was asked to play some interesting work / inspire them to give it a go. I DO love playing radio for a captive audience!

2. Spending nearly 15 hours over the course of two days yakking, listening, debating, and deconstructing radio docs and features in every which way, with  around 25 Irish producers. Hearing docs about potatoes (!), traditional songs of the traveling people, a horse-racing dynasty, a street musician, a woman who communicates with the dead (and bellydances), and more. Learning more about life as an independent Irish producer - the challenges, the opportunities, and the importance of community.

3. Saturday night out at the Patriots Inn, where the discussions continued over many beers. And where a nice woman walked around with a tray of sandwiches around her neck. And where I made it clear that no, I wouldn't be joining the karaoke activities - that I "don't karaoke." Or wouldn't, unless there was the opportunity to sing one particular song - a pledge I'd made years ago. Was quite certain the Patriots Inn would not, in a million years, cough up the song. (You see where this is going, don't you?) Cut to a few drinks + a tequila shot later, when I heard something that sounded like..."Shapiro" and..."windy city" coming from the other room. By which I mean the room where people were taking turns belting out song after song after song into the sweaty microphone controlled by the venerable karaoke emcee who was patiently repeating my name and city of origin, and scanning the audience, ready to cue up the next song. Have you ever noticed how much people enjoy saying "Chicago?"

Yes, my excellent Irish hosts had done the favor of signing me up, and requesting THAT song. Lo and behold - anything is possible in this great age, every song is findable on the internet, karaoke-ready. I should have known/figured. By then it was too late to refuse, and it didn't seem like that bad an idea to sing Joe Jackson's "Steppin' Out" to a room full of jolly, intoxicated, encouraging Irishmen and women. In fact, it seemed like a great idea. A really great idea. Apparently I didn't do half bad, and was especially good at drumming up audience participation. Who knew?

4. The after-Patriots Inn adventure, bravely embarked upon by myself and two others, and involving a guy named Kevin who lived nearby,  a stuffed cat, Zimbabwean currency pinned to the wall, and American classic rock. Those are about all of the details you need. Or don't need.

5. Watching Zenyatta swoop in from last place to win her seventeenth straight race, via the live streaming feed on my laptop. (1:30 am Dublin-time.) Nathaniel was watching too, back in Chicago. We were typing at each other the whole time. Romantic, I know!

6. Stopping in at Road Records before heading out to the airport on my last morning, and picking up some new music - This Is the Kit's Krulle Bol, and a beautiful, Rachel's-esque record by a band called Sending Letters to the Sea.

7. Watching Temple Grandin on the flight back home. And weeping, which I think made the sweet Irish man sitting next to me, who was heading home to Idaho,  a little bit uncomfortable. He was very gracious about this, and told me it "looked like a very good movie." I wept because it's a touching film, and because I'm emotionally vulnerable when 35,000 feet up in the air, and because I'd gotten very little sleep in the past four days. But this seemed like too much to explain.

So that's my trip to Dublin, more or less. Keep an eye on the Third Coast website for some feisty Irish documentary work, and keep an eye right here to find out whether or not my Patriots Inn karaoke experience was a one-off, drunken anomaly, or the beginning of a new era in my life. I'd put money  on the former...