Blow, Man, Blow! Archie Shepp and Jazz School

Archie Shepp, Professor of Jazz

Archie Shepp came to UMass in 1971 to teach Jazz Ensemble and History of African American Music, and it was the beginning of a long and fruitful association.  On tenor sax, Shepp was among a cadre of recruited faculty who would build a pre-eminent jazz braintrust in swingin' Amherst.

Drummer Max Roach was aboard for the ride.  So, by the way, was horn-blowin' elder statesman Yusef Lateef, nee Bill Huddleston, who also performed as Bill Evans ("I"), not to be confused with other jazz musicians Bill Evans ("II" - pianist) and Bill Evans ("III" - other tenor saxaphonist)... Oy!

In-Crowd scene-ster

On arrival in Amherst, Archie was already established as a giant since his groundbreaking 1960's work, which included performing on Coltrane's Ascension (Shepp's earlier contributions in collaboration on the A Love Supreme sessions were left on the cutting room floor, but can now be enjoyed here).

Archie's eldest son Pavel, two years behind me in school, was a good friend of my brother's and Pavel also played drums in Jazz Workshop, where I was swinging the bass my senior year.

I saw Archie a number of times, and met him first, when he would come to pick Pavel up from football practice as we soccer booters too were being released from locker room miasma into the same rich Amherst air.

Shepp/Porter: Rhythm Unlimited.

But it was with awestruck reverence that we Jazz Workshoppers - runny-nosed mere mortals - performed when Archie seated himself among the parents for our year-end concert.  My big moments as bassist were on the Mingus standard Goodbye, Pork Pie Hat and on Bill Evans II's awesome So What? that everyone associates with Miles Davis' Kind Of Blue LP.

As we self-consciously plowed through these standards - in-form to begin, free-form to unwind, back into form to close - I saw Archie rocking slowly to the former, and then nodding in time as I kicked off the latter.  Fortunately, I had managed to not disgrace myself.  As it turns out, 'twas the pinnacle of my jazz career.  Hot socks, we wuz hittin' on all sixes.

Archie's still at it, mostly in Paris but, like a giant who steps down from Olympus, he visits Amherst from time to time.

Here's a video of Archie playing recently, and featuring Tom McClung (Amherst Regional H.S. too!) on keys.

... to Olympus

From Earth...

How bold of UMass to assemble the jazz all-star club.  Archie and Max collaborated, and everyone grooved.  And I mean everyone!

Professor Roland Wiggins, whose daughter Roz cooked me crepes once, was the svengali behind this recruiting triumph.  We in this lovely town are truly, truly blessed.

I Tell Ya, Things Have Got To Change!

Pinning that Monkey Tail on Donna Rice!

You all remember the excitement in 1987 when a rare role model in the American Rhapsody, Yale Divinity School grad Gary Hart, dared the media to put a tail on him and try to substantiate the rumors that he was fooling around.  Well, Gary got his wish.


From Wikipedia:

Hart '88? Monkey Business '87!

Soon after meeting Rice, Hart announced that he would run for nomination as the Democratic candidate for President. Having enjoyed a surprisingly strong campaign in 1984 against the eventual nominee, former Vice President Walter Mondale, he was widely perceived as a front-runner for the Democratic nomination in 1988. However, rumors shortly thereafter began circulating about his having an extra-marital affair, leading the candidate to challenge the media to surveil him, and to also claim that anybody who did so would "be very bored." The day before Hart's dare to the media was to appear in The New York Times, however, two reporters for the Miami Herald observed Rice coming out of Hart's Washington, D.C. townhouse, and their story was published on the same day that his challenge appeared in the Times.

"President Hart"

While Hart contended that the reporters could have no knowledge of exactly when Rice arrived or why she was there, his popular appeal nevertheless suffered a major blow, and polls taken almost immediately afterward found him to be 10 points behind Massachusetts governor Michael Dukakis. Two days after their initial story, the Herald obtained a photograph of Rice sitting on Hart's lap in Bimini aboard a luxury motor yacht named Monkey Business lent by socialite Lillian Briggs. The celebrity tabloid National Enquirer immediately published the photograph, and within five days, Hart had decided to drop out of the Democratic Presidential nomination race.^[2][3]

Early on, a 'Marketing' career

Well, turns out that the comely Rice had tried her hand at a variety of callings.  She had been a marketing specialist in south FL for a pharma company before all the fuss.  After the fuss, she found an audience as celebrity endorser for No Excuses jeans, but by 1994 had found her true calling - protecting children from exploitation and abuse on the internet. 

For almost 20 years she's done a great job with Enough Is Enough, and she's still at it.

So it was in that mode and guise that Donna appeared, in 1998, and we came face to face.  I was out hob-nobbing at a big weekday-evening confab in Reston,VA with Mario Morino and the NetPreneur crowd when, Lo and Behold: Ms. Rice (by then Hughes, married to NoVa area venture capital guy Jack).

She was instantly-recognizable, very friendly, vivacious, and/but totally on-message.  I shamelessly referenced my then-four-year-old daughter to get the ball rolling, and eventually, artlessly, brought up politics (but not Presidential) - however, I couldn't get her out of trade-show-booth mode. . .

A bit like Jeannie Francis ?

. . . Just as well.

On Deck with Commissioner Bud Selig

Onward/Upward Bud

Warming Up for July 10 MLB All-Star Game in Kansas City!

In 1982, as a wandering neophyte lost in a fascinating and not-too-unfriendly world, I did research for consulting firm CTM to develop something wild called "SSN, the SuperSportsNetwork."

In those days of proliferating cable networks, SSN was to be a confederated joint venture of MLB team owners that would satellite-deliver a program of out-of-market baseball games to cable subscribers: you'd see your home team all season long except on nights when they played at home and had not sold out the park; on those nights you'd tap the exchange and receive the best game from around the league.

We got 23 of the 26 owner groups to convene at the O'Hare Hilton for a huge confab - two or three folks from each team.  The Cubs (WGN), Braves (WTBS) and Mets (WOR) had already cast their lot with new "cable superstations" and would not/could not participate.

Why HIM?  Why not ME ???

2008 MLB All-Star Game - Bud and SJP at Yankee Stadium (4-3 A.L.)

Well, I've worked in finance and television, and had unhealthy immersion in politics and academia - all rife with big, needy, overblown egos - but never have I been in a room with more blustering, braying, domineering jackasses at one time (well, I attended a U.N. General Assembly proceeding once, but that's another story).  Many of the club owners were also very charming in a back-slapping way, but every single one of these grand-standers was cruelly suspicious of his confreres.

The meeting was a riot.  My glamorous job?  Running laps of the giant horseshoe table where the 65 primo donno participants were seated, and handing out papers.

Beer Keg Swings Bat - COOL!

Oy!  One character who was well-behaved, and lingered late to chew the fat with my boss Bob Schmidt, was Milwaukee Brewers owner (later to become MLB Commissioner) Bud Selig. He was genuinely interested in the proposition, and would visit us in McLean VA later that year following the Brewers' heroic October appearance in the "Suds Series" (Brewers lost in seven).

As we swept up the room and prepared to vacate for a late plane back east, I spotted Bud pull a bright white baseball from the pocket of his brown corduroy suit jacket, take a Bic pen right out of Bob's shirt pocket, and scribble his autograph: "Good luck, Bob! Bud Selig"

The ball occupied a place of honor on Bob's desk and I admired it until something else happened to it...

to be continued.

Grabbing Lunch with Sam Donaldson

Unabashed Texan Sam Donaldson

When I visited Washington DC to tour Georgetown Univesity and GWU with my father in 1975, we stayed at the grand and stately Mayflower Hotel.  As a rube in the big city, I was amazed at the size of this hotel - a full city block long: one could enter on Connecticut Ave. and exit on 17th street.

The northern edge of the hotel was bounded by DeSales Street, NW, a one block long mid-block connector between the two avenues.  And opposite the Mayflower (just outside our window), across DeSales Street at mid-block, was ABC News' Washington DC bureau.  How cool - people making television, right there!

Ten years later, I was working 1/2 block away on 17th Street at the National Geographic Society, and we usd to graze around the neighborhood, picking off a number of researchers from NPR and ABC News when we were staffing up NG EXPLORER.

ABC sits chock-a-block with a parking garage and there was a small, greasy spoon lunch counter there in the mid-80's.  I don't remember the name of it but one day we were all piled in there, jockeying at the counter, when a loud, bold and insistently-recognizable voice cut through the din: "Ham and Swiss!  Right Here!! - That's Mine!!!"  He reached above and across the throng, grabbed the bag, threw a $5 bill at the counter guy who laughed, and he bolted.

"People ask me about my relationship with President Reagan. I say it was a case of two 'hams' discovering each other. Only I played the 'straight man' and he always had the last word."

One of his most widely remembered questions during his tenure at the White House came during the Reagan administration: "Mr. President, in talking about the continuing recession tonight, you have blamed Congress and mistakes in the past. Does any of the blame belong to you?" To which Reagan retorted: "Yes, for many years I was a Democrat!"

On a Wild Nantucket Sleighride with Roy Bailey

Time to dream, and dream, and daydream again about Nantucket Island summers.

Happy Father's Day to my Dad, and here's a Nantucket reprise in honor of my parents spending the week now in Wauwinet...

In the Bailey Studio...

In the 1960's, one of Nantucket's great artists-in-residence was Roy Bailey, whose upstairs gallery above Miltimore's Dress Shop was on the corner of Orange Street and South Main Street, just up from where Mitchell's Bookshop now sits, and below Murray's Toggery.

Gorgeous

My parents knew Roy through some good mutual friends - natives, I'm obliged to point out - and collected a few of his pieces.

James Dean-esque and seductively dashing, Bailey was active in the art and performing arts community, and a regular in the Opera House, where a good martini could always be had, and a Coke at the bar would cost you $1 in 1968 (at the time, it was $.10 or .15 everywhere else on the island!).

Sixties island hoi-polloi would congregate in the Opera House after sailing, for evenings of tale-telling and tail-chasing.  It was a swinging scene among the yacht club set, up-and-comers, and Snopeses of all stripes.

Porters' Quarters, 59 Fair

At the time, we had a place on Fair Street, a short stroll away.

Now, if you read your Melville, you know that a Nantucket Sleighride is local (early 19th century) slang for the ride you and your (possibly doomed) friends took once the leashed harpoon you'd hurled found its mark in the whale's flesh and he took you for a long and rough ride, sometimes for hours... sometimes to the bottom of the sea.  Reference Captain Ahab.

Gentlemen of a certain age know well, also, that "Nantucket Sleighride" refers to a 5:50 rock classic (blended ballad/dirge and riff-rock roarer) from the 1971 album of the same name by monumental heavy/dinosaur band Mountain (alternately, to its 32-minute cousin from the live "Twin Peaks" album, much and painfully inferior).  As Mountain were preparing to release the great (I think their best) album Nantucket Sleighride, the band either selected - or commissioned anew - an etching by Bailey to illustrate the inner album spread.

I'd stared at this illustration ['Drawing of a Nantucket Sleighride'] many times - but only years later, after college, did I notice the attribution and realize it was ol' Roy who'd 'drawn' it.

"Three years sailing on bended knee ..."

So when in 1998 while biking into town now on Vestal Street I spotted Bailey's shingle, I hustled in to find him, aging and a bit brittle.

We introduced ourselves and chatted about the 'golden age' of Nantucket for ten minutes or so.  Then I revealed my real interest - to buy a print of the Nantucket Sleighride key art.

"Wow!" he shouted - "it's been years and years since anyone has even mentioned that piece to me!  I didn't think anyone remembered.  I barely remember it myself!"

Visit the Nantucket Whaling Museum

He did not have the print to sell - for all he knew, it had gone ages ago to Davy Jones' locker.  We reminisced and he let me know the connection had come about through a Nantucket fellow - "young man, don't remember his name now, but might have been a Coffin descendant" - who was friendly with the band and knew of their fascination with Nantucket, whaling, and the story of the whaleship Essex, all inspirations for the album.

Here is a nice Father's Day themed article about Roy Bailey.

Roy passed away in 2002 but he lives on in the memory of many a Nantucket "Golden-Ager' . . . as does this particular work of his in the hearts and minds of many I'd venture utterly unwitting rock fans of 40 years ago!!

John Edwards - A Painful Fall From Grace

"While I do not believe I did anything illegal, or ever thought I was doing anything illegal, I did an awful, awful lot that was wrong and there is no one else responsible for my sins.  I am responsible, and if I want to find the person who should be held accountable for my sins, honestly I don't have to go any further than the mirror.  It's me.  It is me and me alone."

Sunshine, Go Away Today - Don't Feel Much Like Smilin'

When John Edwards ran for president in 2004 he lamented with passion about "the two America's, ... where some attend the public schools in the good neighborhoods, with the well stocked library, and the nice athletic fields, and the clean classrooms... while others sit in crumbling buildings, with no books to study, and no opportunity to ever get ahead ..."  What he never remembered to mention was the third America - where his kids and mine went to private school and enjoyed excellent teaching and attention, with all the amenities.

Edwards came to town following election in November 1998 as Senator for North Carolina.  He later smartly enrolled his young children in St. Patrick's Episcopal Day School, where my daughter also attended.

"President Edwards"

It wasn't unusual to see a 'public servant' like Ken Bentsen, Jr. (D, TX 25th) or media politicos like Tucker Carlson and Cokie Roberts around the corridors.  But there was definitely a buzz around Mr. Edwards, a dapper barrister rumored to have Presidential ambitions.

You are correct if you imagine that Elizabeth Edwards was a much, much, much beloved woman in the school. Very involved, and very full of life.  She is deeply missed by the staff and many friends she made among the parent/volunteer tribe, and when we worked together on the annual fundraising auction she made a point to contribute a week at the Edwardses' North Carolina beach house.  Separately, we arranged to offer a luncheon in Washington with John, for the high bidder and ten guests.  The private meal was hosted at Sen. Edwards' next door neighbor's very beautiful home in what had been until 1959 the Cuban Embassy on 30th Street, N.W.

That particular prize went for the high bid of the evening, over $20,000, purchased by the wife of a lobbyist.  Welcome to Washington!

Beloved Alma Mater: St. Patrick's

On Family Fun Day in spring 2003, there was Senator John Edwards, on campus.  We passed each other in the hallway between the church nave and the school development office at St. Patrick's Episcopal Day School.  Holding hands with his young children Emma Claire and Jack, he looked kind and fatherly, but intensely focused at the same time - he was thinking about something.  "Hello, Senator!" I ventured, and in response he smiled gently, nodded in my direction and kept moving.

I was struck by his height - maybe my height at best - 5'6".  He's listed as 5'11" but on this day he was 5'6" - or else on that day I was 5'11"! In this sense, I guess, I was uplifted by his presence.

That was nine years ago this month.  Much water has passed under the Edwards bridge.  John launched his own 2004 Presidential run resulting in selection as Sen. John Kerry's Vice President.  Edwards later made an aborted attempt for the 2008 nomination as well, but by then was mired already in a terrible cascade of family betrayal & loss, and personal, political and ethical scandal.  Some might say today that, under Ponte Edouard, justice has rolled down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.  But in the end, none of us - saints and sinners alike - really know.

There has been precious little Family Fun for John Edwards lately.  I despair for his children, and miss his wife, and I hope that time is kind to all concerned.

Heat Wave: My Ice-Cream Eating Marathon with Ben & Jerry

I Scream, You Scream - We ALL Scream for Ice Cream!

I got to crash a weekend-long confab of Ben & Jerry's "Scoop Shop" Operators, with ice cream for breakfast, lunch, dinner and every possible between-meal snack.

Irresistible Delight, served up by Dynamic Duo

Ben & Jerry were rewarding the operators for their hard work by taking over a conference facility near Phoenix, gathering the scoopers to celebrate their success, preview the coming new flavors and "novelties," exchange tips, and discuss all things ice cream.

The ticket? My piece of the multi-front effort to launch Animal Planet cable network was the development and publishing of Animal Planet CD-ROM, an animal encyclopedia and one of the first ever "internet-linked!" titles (animal video profiles on the disc connected to MS Encarta entries).  We'd cut a fun cross promotion deal with Ben & Jerry - they'd promote Animal Planet and give a $5-off coupon for the CD-ROM on the lid of every carton of Rain Forest Crunch (2 million units) and we'd promote Ben & Jery's by advertising a "free pint" coupon inside every CD-ROM package.

Save Rainforest by Eating

Usually I'd send the project manager on the road to do these previews.  In this special case, I pulled rank and went west to do the demo myself.

Those days and nights in Phoenix were long, and filled with ice cream.  The guys by then were fairly rotund (occupational hazard) and jolly (I'd be too), and Jerry in particular was genuinely interested in where we planned to go with the television network.  We discussed at length over Peace Pops - at the time, Animal Planet was envisioned to be a nature documentary and human/animal interest channel, and a strong advertising play.  Of course now it has become nothing but exploitative "reality"....  A violation?  Perhaps we were meant for each other (read on).

My afternoon demo followed the Marketing presentation:

Remember, Ben and Jerry's' well-earned brand promise is rich-tasting deliciousness based on innovative flavor combinations and mix-in's.  No one was ever going to look to B&J for vanilla (though their vanilla is unquestionably delicious).  But in spring 1996, the Marketing department had the idea that vanilla was the future for B&J.  Marketing Girl's logic? "People buy our pints, but we need market share of Ice Cream 'Occasions' - nobody's going to buy pints of NY Super Fudge Chunk to serve with the Thanksgiving pie, or at junior's 10th birthday party."

Ben & Jerry - Young Idealists

Well, that idea never panned out.  People don't look to Ben & Jerry's for vanilla (and if they do want a gallon of vanilla, they won't visit the scoop shop and stand in line to see it hand-packed).

Talk about following your bliss: here are a couple of ice-cream loving best friends from Merrick, NY who conquered the world of ice cream.

Cool Like a Brain-Freeze:
Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield were so "cool" they could, in corporate life, violate their socially-minded/counterculture identification with moves like the hiring of expert CEO Perry Odak from U.S. Repeating Arms Corporation (manufacturer of Winchester rifles), and ultimately the $326M exit sale to corporate megalith  Unilever.  Both were the right move, btw.

But now the duo are "Occupy Wall-Streeters" ...

Credit Where Due:

Come to Northampton MA, visit Herrell's, and meet Steve - the Albert Einstein behind the mix-in.  He selflessly schooled Ben and Jerry and they took the concept all the way to the bank.  But only Steve has the Hostess Cupcake Ice Cream Sundae...!

On-Stage with Tony Goldwyn

Tony Goldwyn ... presently President Fitz ... formerly Crow

He's the President of the United States now - on Scandal, that is - but in 1978 he was just a fresh-faced lad landing the second lead in a campus production of Sam Shepard's "Tooth of Crime," and we became friends.

Lights, Camera, Beer... in the Pub

My roommate and fraternity brother Chris Walsh played the aging and decidedly Jagger-esque rock star Hoss, who is challenged and ultimately unseated by the up-and-coming rock star Crow, played by freshman Tony Goldwyn.  This play was cast during the early autumn and produced that semester.

7 Truly Bold Plays by Master Sam

Four of us - Dave Scofield, Dave Schleifer, John S. Keim, and yours truly - comprised the band.  Billed as the "Overhead Lifters," the band was on-stage and the music was an up-front element of the play, particularly during Becky's soliloquy, and the scene when the two rockers square off inside a boxing ring as the Rolling Stones' "Sister Morphine" plays.

In another scene, Crow warms up for a confrontation by singing Cream's "I'm So Glad."

Following this exposure to Sam Shepard, I became a fan - and particularly loved seeing the Quaid brothers tear up the stage in "True West" at the Cherry Lane theater in 1984.  As for Tooth of Crime, I can recite every word of dialog in this fantastic play.

What I most vividly remember about our little Minor Theater production at Hamilton College are two mesmerizing, invigorating vignettes: Tony warming up behind stage using bizarre impressive and in-your-face method acting technique, and - in the second act, night after night - "Becky" taking her shirt off ten feet away on-stage, while delivering a bitter monologue.

Have a "Futchnerf's" Summer

Chris and I tried unsuccessfully to rush Tony for Psi Upsilon, but he went to Sigma Phi instead, and ultimately left Hamilton early.  Next stop was Brandeis University and I don't believe he even admits to having attended Hamilton, now.

I ran into Tony on the street in NYC the summer of 1980, and since then I've seen him as you have: a cad in Ghost, a lawyer in The Pelican Brief, behind camera (as Director) with the tremendous A Walk on the Moon, and now - his star turn on TV as Fitzgerald Grant, President of the USA, in Scandal.

I suppose that Tooth of Crime - the zenith of my own stage career, as I never auditioned for anything else, before or after - was a small but wildly interesting steppingstone on Mr. Goldwyn's path to craft mastery.  I remember Tony well as a genuinely nice guy,  unassuming - even quiet, while also full of energy and intensity - a totally committed thespian.

And he's really knocking it out of the park on Scandal!

"I'll develop my own image. I'm an original man. A one and only. I just need some help."

... as Crow, in Tooth of Crime