Work?

November 18, 2009
I am fortunate that I have a job that pretty much just entails playing music with kids all day. Like any worthwhile job, it has its challenges, but I take so much joy from it because they give so much joy. It is so natural for them and they express themselves so beautifully; it inspires me so i do my best to inspire them. I work in different areas of early childhood music, from classes with parents and under-4 year olds to preschool settings and individual lessons. Sometimes I record our adventures on my iPhone. I wanted to share some…

Busted up kids faces

November 12, 2009
I have been noticing many kids in my classes with facial scrapes and cuts from falling and smashing their faces into something hard. It is painful to think about the accident that must have occurred but 99% of the time everything heals beautifully and they have learned a valuable lesson that it pays to stay upright. We can gain something from all of our painful tumbles and in fact, we require them; they are all just part of growing up. Kids truly live in the moment. They explore and play to enjoy and comprehend reality. When they get hurt it…

Tranny Fun

November 7, 2009
I was de-virginized last night at my first Rocky Horror Picture Show experience and it was, as I had been warned, highly participatory. If you yourself are still a virgin, I will enlighten you: the ridiculous 1975 rock musical B-movie is augmented by a group of live actors who dress (scantily) as the actors and lip-synch the lines while yelling commentary at the screen. Audiences are encouraged to throw stuff, dance and yell at appropriate or inappropriate moments. Before the midnight show at Clearview Cinemas in Chelsea, all the virgins--as in audience members who had never seen the show before--were…

Disheartening

November 5, 2009
Maine--I love you so much, how can your love be so conditional? Yesterday's election was a crushing defeat in the the battle for civil rights and equality. While Maine had recently become one of the few states to allow gay marriage, voters rejected the law and proved that we still live in an oppressive and puritanical society. It completely baffles me how someone could be so bigoted and disrespectful of others. Why would it be so important for anyone to deny another person the same rights that they enjoy? I believe it stands to reason that there would not be…

What a Weekend

November 1, 2009
The past 3 days have been jam packed with goodness. There was a flood of Taylors into the city for the action, which began with The Brooklyn Museum show (see below) on Thursday night. Friday was my show at Monkeytown, which was a great experiment in the unique venue and hopefully the first of more evenings there. Saturday was Halloween, which has to be my favorite holiday for the fun and zaniness that defines the night. While I used to love it because of the booty stash I collected and hoarded for months, I now just love a good reason…

Who Shot Rock n Roll

October 30, 2009
When my mother-in-law said two years ago that she was going to write a book about rock n roll photography I was skeptical; while her knowledge of photography is about as deep as anyone in the world, her familiarity with the subject matter was pretty thin. Last night, all doubts were erased as I attended the opening of her exhibition at The Brooklyn Museum. She has pulled together 175 incredible photos from all aspects and generations of rock n roll and presented them beautifully, with text that demonstrates her complete understanding of rock's cultural power. It is inspiring to see…

The Wire

October 25, 2009
I'm a simple man who likes simple things, but life is infinitely complex. And then there's The Wire. It is simply the most intricately detailed and beautifully crafted story I've ever watched. Good guys and bad guys blend into moral ambiguity, while one man's solution is another man's problem. I fundamentally believe that killing anybody is bad, but there were characters and situations that made me question that belief. Some people do what they consider the right thing for the right reasons and still end up making everything worse. The law is constantly being reinterpreted and bent to fit the…

Good in the Hood

October 23, 2009
Tonight was a surprise explosion all over 5th ave. First I found myself bicycling home from work and every 2 blocks there was a musician/band performing on the corner, a beautiful action coordinated by local musicians. I was reminded of Firenze, Italia, where I lived for 3 months in 1999 and was always amazed at the variety of music and art produced in the streets. Not that New York doesn't have it's fair share of incredible buskers, but in Florence (and most of Italy, for that matter) the art was more public. It was a corridor of musical bliss... And…

Where The Wild Things Are

October 20, 2009
When someone showed me the trailer this summer, I freaked out. Obviously, this book was one of my favorites as a young tyke and to see it brought to the big screen by two of my favorite artists working today, Dave Eggers and Spike Jonze, made me giddy like a nine-year old on pixy stix. The film captures the images from the book as well as I could hope, and manages to convey all the conflicting emotions perfectly. It brings me back to a time in my life when everything was hyper-important and my feelings controlled me more than I…