WHERE I AM + WHERE I’M GOING: REFLECTIONS ON MUSIC-MAKING + FILM-MAKING + SEEKING A NEW LITERARY COMMUNITY.

In 2020, Joy on Fire will release a first-ever 

full-length work featuring vocals throughout.

When people ask me what I’m doing with myself these days, the short answer is: making a record, States of America, with Anna Meadors, John Paul Carillo, and Chris Olsen of Joy on Fire, and making a documentary film about the tune “Li’l Liza Jane” with Emily Cohen. (The two activities will eventually intersect when Joy on Fire unfurl a punk-jazz version of “Liza Jane” whilst the cameras roll.) Both music-making and movie-making require a tremendous amount of exertion, as it turns out. One could speculate on the “ups and downs” of the creative cycle, but in reality, there are only up-sides, so long as I’m expending the level of effort that my team-mates require of me. The term “team-mate” of course wouldn’t have applied a few years ago, when I toiled singly as a writer of poems and stories. That work continues, by the way, but unfortunately I’ve grown apart from my long-term involvement with the DC Poetry gang, even as friendships continue with many of its members. Perhaps my next great endeavor will involve entry into another literary community, or founding a brand-new one.

Joy on Fire just concluded an intense period of recordings, as well as a mini-tour that whirled us from the hot rooms of a classic music space in West Philly to a Jersey Shore pool party (“lol”) to the fabulous Lou Costello Room in Baltimore’s Hampden neighborhood. The mini-tour, three venues in three nights, required a fair amount of howling, and by the end, I was a bit hoarse. Joy on Fire describe themselves as “punk jazz,” which means that they’re not timid. To be heard requires projection. It’s quite a different environment from the “funereal quiet” of many literary readings. Even when I’ve given readings in bars, or at outdoor beer festivals, or at flash mob events, I’ve been able to declaim without howling, but now I howl, and truth be told, where has howling been all my life? (I seem to recall a poetry book whose title involved a form of that word—either in advocacy of said act or as testament to its arrival as an art form.) To howl isn’t even half of it, of course. Music and words had to be joined together, in a series of trials, with each member of the combo placing her or his stamp on them. But the biggest adjustment, for me anyhow, has been doing everything by memory. How many times as a writer (hundreds?) have I stood at a lectern, holding the words to my eyes, for easy recital? Don’t do and you won’t learn; don’t learn and you won’t grow. Become a vocalist in a punk-jazz orchestra! 

The great Cajun musician, Iry LeJeune, who died 

in 1955 at age 26 after being struck by an automobile.

Over the course of two years engaging in pre-production tasks centering on Li’l Liza Jane: A Movie About A Song, Emily and I have built a powerful, unbelievable cultural history for a tune—dare I say—more unique than any tune that has developed in North America. I should say “family of songs” since the many titles, melodies, and lyrics easily approximate the breadth of a poetic forms handbook. The research discoveries have been shocking, even triumphant, particularly since they’ve been extraordinarily difficult to achieve, in certain instances. We’ve been mentored by some of the greatest folklorists in the country, including Grammy-winner and author of Big Road Blues, David Evans, who has guided us in the present and “in the past,” and when I say “in the past,” I refer to both historical information as well as an article he published years ago that helped us establish a relationship between the “Liza Jane” family and the Cajun standard “J’étais au bal” (“I was at the dance.”) If you play the version, say, by Cajun legend Iry LeJeune, you can hear where the melody of “J’étais au bal” (sometimes known as “J’ai été au bal”) overlaps with the “Liza Jane” family. This relationship is but one pinprick of starlight—out of hundreds—that helps to establish “Li’l Liza Jane” as a monumental constellation. We look forward to fully telling the epic story of America’s favorite Poor Gal. 

An apartment poetry reading for out-of-town 

literary visitors Cathy Wagner and Susana Gardner.

It’s no accident that I chose a song as subject matter for a documentary foray, since folk poetry informs part of its lengthy history. The thought of poetry sometimes turns my mind toward writing community, and my association with the DC Poetry crowd, in particular. My relationship to that group involved hosting dozens of parties (many legendary); hosting the popular Beer Club Salon of Ideas; and co-hosting several popular happy hours over the course of two decades (Drink & Walk and Public Office Hours, to name two). I even started DJ’ing from my Shakers and Jump Blues projects as the DC Poets took over the basement of the Black Squirrel on Thursday nights for many seasons. I’m grateful for abiding friendships with many writers and performers who hail from both generations of the DC Poetry scene (many now expatriates), including Rod Smith, Heather Fuller, Mark Wallace, Terence Winch, Phyllis Rosenzweig, Tina Darragh, Doug Lang, Casey Smith, Susana Gardner, Joe Ross, Cathy Eisenhower, Maureen Thorson, and Tom Orange, among others. Things change, of course, and I wish the DC Poetry scene good tidings even as I contemplate the next literary community to join (or found).

I’m excited for 2020, when my collaboration with Joy on Fire will result in the release of a limited-edition LP on 180 gram vinyl as well as an EP of six songs. Li’l Liza Jane: A Movie About A Song will enter production, combining an impressive roster of musicians and scholars who will create a durable monument to a deserving folk tune. All the while these two projects have been percolating, I’ve been adding to, shaping, and editing several manuscripts, including a novel, a collection of stories, and at least one collection of poems. I’d love to start reading from my creative writing again, and I’d also love to identify publication opportunities for these manuscripts. Too, I’m nomadic right now, splitting time between the care of my elderly parents and the makes-takes of Trenton, N.J., so I’m on the lookout for an unoccupied shotgun shack somewhere in eastern U.S.A. I’d be interested in knowing if there’s a literary collective out there which needs a bloke like me, or if others felt like bonding together in order to form one. For these, or any reasons, drop me a communiqué, yo! Meanwhile, best wishes to you, and thanks for taking a gander at this here Statement of Human-being-ness. xo