September 2014 – The Great Gray Bridge

One More Time—A Happy Hobbit Birthday!

September 22, 2014/4 Comments/in Books & Writing, Personal History, Family, Friends, Education, Travels /by Philip Turner

I published the piece below two years ago on this date, my birthday. I’m happy to share it here again today, as I turn 60!

As this day, September 22, 2012, stretches toward midnight, it happens to have been my 58th birthday. Growing up, of course I always enjoyed this day, but as I prepared to turn 13 back in 1967, my appreciation of my own birthday had taken a new turn. For earlier that year I first read the work of J.R.R. Tolkien and discovered that all the key action in The Hobbit, and the first book of “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy, The Fellowship of the Ring, was triggered at the birthday parties of Bilbo Baggins,and his nephew Frodo Baggins. And for reasons unknown to me—and so far as I know, never analyzed in all the criticism on Tolkien and Middle Earth—the birthday of uncle and nephew Baggins was September 22. The sharing of my birthday with the brave and indefatigable hobbits was a source of great strength to me during my adolescence. When difficult times arose, I took comfort in the knowledge that I had some sort of kinship with the creative imaginings of such a great writer as Tolkien. His books have been with me at many junctures in my life. Seeing Tolkien’s hobbit protagonists at the center of his sagas made me believe I could be at the center of my own life narrative.

I’ve always liked the fact that the Jewish new year, Rosh Hashana, falls around roughly the same time as my birthday. This year it was just last week. I like that the new year is said to begin in autumn–counter-intuitively–just as life in nature is beginning to fade and die. It sobers one up a bit, reminding us all that we’re not here forever. I don’t need too much reminding of that fact, in as much as starting in my late 30s I lost my father, then in my 40s, two best friends from college—Rob Adams and Karl Petrovich—and in my 50s, my mom and then my brother, Joel. Still, it seems salutary to take note of the leaves falling just as we prepare the turn of another year, as well as the turn from summer into fall.

With Tolkien in mind, my observance of my own birthday this year got off to a good start yesterday when I saw in Shelf Awareness, the bookselling daily e-newsletter, that Tolkien’s US publisher is publishing a new edition of The Hobbit, tying in with Peter Jackson’s movie adaptation of “The Lord of the Rings” prequel, premiering December 14. When the movie opens in a few months, I’ll sort of feel as if it’s almost again, albeit out of season. Meantime, today’s been a good day, thanks to family, friends, and J.R.R. Tolkien.

Carving Space w/Esme Boyce Dance in “Dark and Pretty Flat”

September 20, 2014/0 Comments/in Art, Film, TV, Photography, Fine Printing & Design, Personal History, Family, Friends, Education, Travels, Urban Life & New York City /by Philip Turner

Had an enjoyable time last night at “Dark and Pretty Flat,” a dance performance and multimedia presentation put on by Esmé Boyce Dance. The series of eight linked pieces flowed seamlessly from one to the next against a rolling video backdrop, of wooded roadsides and watery depths; atmospheric guitar playing, both live and looped; and spoken word poetry. The four dancers, in costumes that bore a wood grain texture in gray and peach hues, were sometimes on the floor all together, in pairs, or solo. Carving space with their articulate arms, hands, fingers, legs, feet, and toes, they supplely shifted their weight in to rolls across the floor and shoulder tucks that brought them in to very near proximity with their own torsos, or those of fellow dancers. It was a world premiere, with all the pieces choreographed by Esmé Boyce. Beside directing her eponymous company, she collaborates with the Satellite Collective and is a member of Janis Brenner & Dancers. Other collaborators were: video artist Cody Boyce, Esmé’s brother, music and poetry; actor Ted Levine, reader; architectural designer Chat Travieso, set designer; artist Sue Julien, the two Boyce’s mother, costume designer—she chose the wood grain fabric, and cut the costumes as supplely as the dancers moved.

The performance was at a lower east side combined theater and bar venue Dixon Place, a new one to me. Entering at 161A Chrystie St, between Rivington and Delancey, you walk in on a narrow bar, while small tables, chairs and sofas and a tiny stage are in the back. In that rear area is a stairway down to the basement where there’s a large theater, with upwards of 50 seats in banked rows. As a New Yorker for nearly thirty years, it still fascinates me to discover spaces like this, caverns tucked away beneath the rumbling streets and subways, renovated and built out for creative endeavors. The establishment has a great vibe, whether upstairs or down. It was particularly nice to see Kit Boyce, friend of many years, husband of Sue Julien, father to Esmé and Cody, friends who I first met in Chicago, in the years I regularly went there to visit Franconia College classmate Robert Henry Adams.

After the dances, the full house walked back up the stairs for an instant after party in the bar and seating area. Bouquets were presented to the dancers—Esmé’s mates were Giulla Carotenuto, Kit McDaniel, and Christopher Ralph—and toasts were offered all ’round. I hadn’t been to a dance performance in years, and I found it an aesthetic pleasure to see movement, color, fabric, sound, and light all played to such intriguing effect. There’s one more performance of “Dark and Pretty Flat” tonight. I recommend it highly, or take yourself out to some dance soon.

‘I Blame the Loyalist Ghost,’ Video and Song from Shawn Clark’s New Album

September 19, 2014/in Music, Bands & Radio /by Philip Turner

Charming video for ‘I Blame the Loyalist Ghost,’ a song from Toronto musician Shawn William Clark‘s second album due out 9/23, produced by James Bunton, longtime drummer in Ohbijou. The song begins with the sound of a plucked 4-string tenor guitar, then Clarke plays every instrument in the piece. Enjoy this—it’s like a lazy summer day with balloons and ribbons floating in the sky. I heard Clark during the first night of NXNE this past June, and enjoyed his act a lot. I look forward to hearing his whole album. Note: After putting up the video below, I found I’d encountered a glitch and it won’t play. It may be a victim of unintended geo-fencing—the situation where territorial rights restrictions come in to play—or a technical problem. I am aware of the problem and am working to restore it. Meantime, you can watch it off my site via this link: http://youtu.be/OIIhnwrzBSA

Elliott BROOD Made Feet Stomp on the Lower East Side

September 18, 2014/0 Comments/in Canada, Music, Bands & Radio, Urban Life & New York City /by Philip Turner

The Ontario trio Elliott BROOD played a great set of new songs for a 7pm set at Rockwood Music Hall on Manhattan’s lower east side last night. The early hour meant light was still pouring in the windows off Allen Street as they hit their first downbeat, but the vibe quickly turned funky for the crowd of about twenty-five, for as I wrote about this band after I first heard their live show in 2012:

“The trio’s gritty sound feels as if it’s been imported from the early days of sound recording. More raw than roots, it’s a sonic stew of acoustic guitar, banjo, reverb-ed Fender Stratocaster, harmonica, and thumping drums.”

Rockwood has excellent acoustics, whether the room is crammed or not. Last night, the mix was great and all instruments could be heard well. They played six new songs from their forthcoming album, “Work & Love” (Paperbag Records), and a couple older ones. They announced it was the first time they were playing the new songs for a live audience. Dressed all in white, Casey Laforet (electric and acoustic guitars, and an array of foot pedals he played in sock-clad feet); Mark Sasso (acoustic guitar, harmonica, banjo); and Steve Pitkin (drums and a keyboard set up next to his kit) charmed all with light banter and interesting song reveals. Casey, a still-new parent, introduced one new song, “Each Other’s Kids,” by explaining they wrote it after realizing how much people in their world universally rely on one another to take care of their young children.

I had met them in 2012, so it was good to re-visit afterward, and introduce all three to my wife Kyle Gallup, and our friend, Mike Fitzgerald. I caught up on all the news with Casey, and learned he and his wife are about to have their second child. Steve appreciated I remembered his last name correctly, something I can relate to, since people tend to spell my first name with two lls, though it only has one. I told Mark he had been in good voice, though he said he actually felt like he might be getting a cold. I gave them the card for my blog Honourary Canadian, which I began after I met them the first time. They began packing up for a show tonight at the Black Cat in D.C., then they’re moving on to Bristol, Tennessee—said to be “the birthplace of country music in the USA”—where they’ll be playing the Rhythm and Roots Reunion Festival.

Last night’s only flaw was that the new album isn’t out yet–after hearing the new songs for the 1st time, I’m keen to hear them again. But it will be available Oct 21, and though it would’ve been nice to get a copy right from the hands of band member, I’ll also be glad to purchase it from the great Canadian indie music website, zunior.com, a seller I highly recommend.

George Stroumboulopoulos’ Music Friends On Why CBC Matters

September 15, 2014/in Music, Bands & Radio /by Philip Turner

Turns out the video below is geo-fenced off from the US. Oh, well, this link to it ~~should~~ may work: youtu.be/6pej_w0qWb8?a

I enjoy listening to the Strombo Show on CBC Radio 2 Sunday nights from 8-11pm. Here’s a video his program put out Sept 1, as their new season began. It documents why CBC matters, even in an era when many other media platforms are available for music lovers and cultural consumers to enjoy.

A Gray Day Near the Great Gray Bridge

September 14, 2014/0 Comments/in Bicycling, Urban Life & New York City /by Philip Turner

Post by Philip Turner.

I dodged the raindrops during my bike ride yesterday, managing to get all the way up to Hudson Beach and the GW Bridge, and have time to enjoy the view, before it rained hard.

#FridayReads, Sept 12–George C. Chesbro’s “City of Whispering Stone,” w/Mongo the Magnificent

September 12, 2014/0 Comments/in Books & Writing /by Philip Turner

Continuing my theme from last week, today’s #FridayReads is another mystery featuring Mongo the Magnificent, former circus dwarf turned criminology professor and private eye, in City of Whispering Stone, published in 1978, which I read that year, then ordered and sold in my bookstore, Undercover Books in Cleveland, Ohio. The plot of this novel—Book II in a series that would ultimately have fifteen titles—would have been very topical and timely at the time, as it concerns Iranian students in NYC, an Iranian circus strongman who is a member of the troupe that Mongo once performed in as a headliner, and the political fate of the Shah. In real life, this would have been during the Carter administration and amid the tumultuous revolution that ended with Ayatollah Khomeni and the mullahs in control of the country,when American hostages were held captive for 444 days in Tehran. The mullahs have hold power ever since. Chesbro must’ve had a keen line in to the Iranian expat community in the US, because of the depiction of the dissident students reads like a contemporary dispatch from the New York Times. In the novel, the performer/strongman has mysteriously vanished and Phil Statler, impresario of the Statler Brothers Circus, Mongo’s former boss, hires the detective to locate him. The writing is great—noirish and tough, and very good at revealing the mindset of Mongo, an ultimate outsider who’s never fit in anywhere in his whole life. Back in my bookstore days, I never read beyond the earliest books in the series, so in the weeks to come, I’ll go back in the sequence and re-read Shadow of a Broken Man (1977, Book I), then move on to An Affair of Sorcerers (1979, Book III); and The Beasts of Valhallah (1985, Book IV), and perhaps others.

I do relish reading detective fiction and many different mystery series. As readers here may recall, I’ve written before about the novels of Michael Connelly (who created series character LAPD Detective Harry—short for Hieronymous—Bosch); Henning Mankell (Swedish police lieutenant Kurt Wallander); the late Tony Hillerman (Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee), whose series was revived in 2013 by his daughter, novelist Anne Hillerman, introducing new series character, Bernadette Manuelito; Philip Kerr (Munich police inspector Bernie Gunther); John D. MacDonald (salvage expert Travis McGee); and J. Michael Orenduff (author of the POT THIEF mystery series, with protagonist Hubert Schuze, dealer in Native American ceramics). Last year, I wrote an appreciation of one of Mankell’s Wallander books that can just as well apply to all of these series, edited for inclusion in this post:

Henning Mankell’s thriller 2004 thriller Before the Frost, features Detective Kurt Wallander and his grown daughter Linda, who like he had earlier in life, elects to become a police officer. With surprising synchronicity, in Michael Connelly’s Detective Harry Bosch novel The Drop, (my May 10th, 2013 #FridayReads), his young adult daughter informs him that she is going to choose police work for her career. I don’t believe these two writers, one in Sweden, the other in Los Angeles, read each other’s work or have directly influenced each other. Instead, I believe that these authors—who have each written ten or more books featuring their detective protagonist—become extremely invested in their characters and loyal to them, so that in their protean creativity, they endow the two characters—both late middle-aged single fathers—with full lives and late-in-life-joy from growing closer to their children. This highlights one of the things I love most about these books, Mankell’s and Connelly’s, as well as mysteries by other authors I enjoy, featuring characters Travis McGee, Bernie Gunther, and Joe Gunther (no relation to the former), by John D. MacDonald, Philip Kerr, and Archer Mayor, respectively: The author is so devoted to their creation that they give them full lives, and I as a faithful reader, become devoted to them, too.

Annals of (Un)employment Injustice

September 12, 2014/0 Comments/in Personal History, Family, Friends, Education, Travels /by Philip Turner

In a handwritten letter written last month, an Aliquippa, Pennsylvania oral surgeon, Dr George Visnich, fired a female employee, Carol Jumper—who had worked for his medical practice for twelve years—after she informed him she’d been diagnosed with “cancer affecting her ovaries, liver, and pancreas.” Ever since my own brush with wrongful dismissal I pay special attention to accounts like this one, reported yesterday by Huffington Post. The doctor’s attorney has since claimed that the letter was meant to make it easy for Jumper to qualify for unemployment benefits, and that the doctor intended to re-hire her once and if her treatment was successful. And yet, the letter is as curt and unfeeling as anything I’ve ever read. See for yourself:

The letter, which I read as filled with eagerness to terminate her before she might cost the doctor an extra dollar in raised health insurance premiums, was shared on Facebook by a friend of the fired employee, resulting in much opprobrium for the doctor and contributions to a benefit fund for Ms Jumper. I detect bad faith on the doctor’s part, with careful wording meant to protect him from the Americans with Disabilities Act, under which “current and recovering cancer patients are protected against job discrimination…so long as the individual is able to perform the job’s essential functions.” He wrote, ” You will not be able to function in my office at the level required while battling for your life. Because of this, I am laying you off without pay as of August 11, 2014.” He’s evidently tried to absolve himself, by claiming that “this [would] make it easier” for Jumper to claim unemployment benefits, but I detect a convenient calculation behind his words—I believe they were meant to make things easier for him, not his long-serving, mortally ill, employee.

Local reporting on the incident explains that Ms Jumper did not ask anyone to put the letter on Facebook, and that she is focused on trying to get well, not on her former employer. She is probably not pursuing a legal case, which I understand, under the circumstances. Unfortunately, none of the reporting reveals what she’s doing about health insurance now, but I assume she’s been forced into COBRA to continue the coverage she had under her employer. No word in any of these stories, either, as to whether he offered her any severance or help with paying for COBRA. I have to assume he has not. Meanwhile, the doctor’s lawyer says that the attention on the letter has been “very troubling” for his client. Gee, you’d almost think he was the one with cancer.