NEWS FEATURES for this week, published April 20, 2013

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In addition to the new edition of LIVE EVENTS, at a separate click on this festival-filled weekend, the Guide is resuming emphasis on bringing you news and reviews. That’s what this edition is all about, with five new feature stories:
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1) RON SARFATY BENEFIT, May 5: Musicians’ Friend Indeed is a Friend in Need
2) HERBIE KATZ, harmonica player with WUMBLOOZO, in memoriam
3) TOPANGA BANJO FIDDLE CONTEST & FOLK FESTIVAL to offer on-site instrument repair, by luthier NOWELL SIEGEL
4) ARTISTWORKS brings big some big names in Bluegrass-Americana to its online offerings
5) PULITZER PRIZE for Music announced April 15
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Here are these feature stories:
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#1 story:
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RON SARFATY BENEFIT, May 5: Musicians’ Friend Indeed is a Friend in Need
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Wheelchair-bound Videographer’s Fate Inspires Songwriters
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RON SARFATY is "the guy in the wheel chair" who video tapes the singer-songwriters all over Los Angeles without ever charging a dime. Well, he can’t do that right now. Seems he totaled his specially-equipped wheel-chair-accessible van a couple of weeks ago. He’s physically okay, but has lost his independence.
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An important portion of the singer-songwriter community is staging a benefit to raise the money he needs to buy a “new” used van, and the adaptive equipment that needs to be installed so he can drive it.
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Ron has insurance for the van but it covers only the current value, and it’s 18 years old with 250,000 miles. Obviously insurance is far short of replacement value.
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Ron has been a major asset to the singer-songwriter community for 11 years, video-taping performers at their gigs and editing the videos for them, all for free. So, it’s obvious why a great many in the music community want to rally to help him.
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The RON SARFATY BENEFIT SHOW will happen Sunday, May 5, from 7-11 pm, at The Talking Stick Coffee Lounge in Venice. The evening will feature a songwriter-in-the-round with WENDY WALDMAN, JOHN BATDORF, and DAVE TUCKER. Stage performances by many well-loved L.A.-based artists will include LAUREN ADAMS, SEVERIN BROWNE, FUR DIXON, SUSIE GLAZE, JEFF GOLD, EARL GREY & LISA JOHNSON, TOM HUBBARD & KEN HOLME (H2), MICHAEL WESLEY HUGHES, ARLENE KOLE, JOHN MOLLENHAUER, DAVE MORRISON, LISA NEMZO, TRACY NEWMAN, TARA SITSER, GARY STOCKDALE, RIC TAYLOR, TIM TEDROW & TERRY VREELAND, JAYNEE THORNE, ED TREE, CHAD WATSON & PAM LOE, JOYCE WOODSON, and JOHN ZIPPERER. In addition, there are “upstairs song circles” for open participation hosted by TOM HUBBARD and JOHN MOLLENHAUER, aka JOHN M. Throughout, the emcee will be JOHN ZIPPERER.
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Aside from the roster of talent performing at the benefit, community involvement includes various house concert and small venue promoters, including Russell & Julie Paris (Oak Park), Jaynee Thorne (North Hills), Jeff Gold - West Valley Music Center (West Hills), John & Julie Zipperer (Northridge), Lauri Reimer - The Talking Stick (Venice), Steve Brogden - Thousand Oaks Library, Lauren Adams - Genghis Cohen (Los Angeles), and Bob Stane – Coffee Gallery Backstage (Altadena). Other prominent singer-songwriter advocates pitching in are Roz Larman (KPFK Folkscene radio show) and Paul Zollo (editor of American Songwriter and Blue Railroad magazine). The Acoustic Americana Music Guide is helping to promote the benefit show.
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Ron first starting videotaping singer-songwriters in 2001, before the stroke he suffered in 2004 that left him wheelchair dependent. Being an ardent fan of the music, he began doing it because it enabled him to give back to the artist’s whose music he loved. Unable to fully recover from the stroke, he just continued dedicating his time and expertise to the artists. His donated work, to date, includes taping 100+ performers, and editing at least 500 separate videos from their performances.
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He has produced multiple music videos and DVDs, all out of pocket. A list of the better known songwriters for whom he has produced videos includes jazz great Mike Garson, virtuoso violinist Drew Tretick, Grammy award winner Wendy Waldman, jazz singer Nnenna Freelon, and National treasures - Berkley Hart, Dan Navarro, Nathan Rogers, Severin Browne, John Batdorf and James Lee Stanley. A list of the better known venues where he’s shot videos includes: McCabes Guitar Shop, The Broad Theater (Santa Monica), SOKA University, Coffee Galley Backstage, Topanga Banjo and Fiddle Contest, Tucson Folk Festival, The Stern Grove Festival in San Francisco, Four Friends Gallery in Thousand Oaks, and the Simi Valley Cultural Center.
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Videos can be the singer-songwriter's most valuable tool in the digital age. They're used to pitch to promoters for gigs and are uploaded to YouTube to promote the artist to both local and global audiences. Singer-songwriters’ websites are used as press kits with the video as the make-or-break aspect in assessing the performer's impression. The cost of these videos, to the singer-songwriters who are often independent artists with little or no backing, can range from hundreds to thousands of dollars. Ron’s generosity has been immense, which is why the response to give back to this very kind and generous man has been immense.
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The “BENEFIT FOR RON SARFATY” is May 5th, 7-11 pm, at The Talking Stick Coffee Lounge, 1411 Lincoln Bl, Venice 90291; 310- 450-6052; www.thetalkingstick.net. Whether or not you can attend, you can donate at www.houseconcerts.us/ron. Paypal and tax deductible options are available there, along with information for making donations by personal check.
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#2 story:
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HERBIE KATZ, harmonica player with WUMBLOOZO, in memoriam
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by Larry Wines
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The world has lost a fine blues harmonica virtuoso, and an even better person, a real character, and a musical presence.
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Herbie Katz, aka “Doctor Fun,” always impressed me with the warmth of his personality, as well as his musicianship. At what turned out to be the last benefit for him at the Coffee Gallery Backstage, we heard him play that sweet blues harmonica one more time, though each song required that he quietly retreat into a dark corner and marshal his strength to come back on stage for another one. Herbie’s stage time also included talk of his attending both Woodstocks, the second with his son, where they encountered more mud than Herbie had seen at the first one. That rerun was the age of the mosh pit. The original quagmire was the accidental product of brief torrential rain. Herbie explained all, in detail.
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We had seen Herbie a few weeks earlier, and spent a little time with him on the closing day of the NAMM show. There, he raced around in an electric scooter chair, doing tight slaloms through the crowd like an Olympic skier threading the gates, and going so fast we would lose track of him until he raced back, going the other way.
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Many of us probably knew Herbie from a series of vignettes. Hanging out with him outside Joe's Great American Bar & Grill, engaging in delightful conversations about music, life, the universe, and everything. That was before he was sick. As was his performance with WUMBLOOZO at the Concert for Haiti that I produced, when I was too busy to have the conversation with him that I remember wishing at the time that I could have had.
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I will always regret that I never got around to accepting his invitation to go visit him at home for lunch. I guess I thought we had plenty of time. His smiling presence made it seem like he would always be there, an indomitable happy warrior who would prevail against cancer. In spirit, I guess he did. I will miss him. I can't imagine how those close to him will deal with the loss.
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We will keep our readers posted on a pending memorial, being planned by his son Michael – the one he took to Woodstock 2.
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#3 story:
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TOPANGA BANJO FIDDLE CONTEST & FOLK FESTIVAL will include on-site instrument repair, by luthier NOWELL SIEGEL
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It’s innovative, and the news will be welcomed by many musicians, from contestants to pros playing scheduled stage sets, to jammers who (yikes!) drop and ding something, or just aren’t happy with the way their instrument sounds.
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Professional luthier NOWELL SIEGEL of Living Tree Music is known for crafting beautiful custom guitars, and like most instrument builders at his level, you don’t envision him disassembling a wreck for transplant surgery or fret-board-ectomies. But that goes with the territory, as do minor adjustments that make all the difference in whether a string buzzes or fails to resonate with enough sustain.
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Sure, the best music stores have good people in their repair departments, and sometimes you get to see them and discuss what’s what with your baby before you have to drop it off and await a phone call to come and get it and the bill. But this is different. Part triage, part shade tree mechanic, it’ll be a discovery for many at TBFC, but we thought folks might like to know about it ahead of time, and take that troublesome possessed-by-gremlins instrument for a little face-to-face analysis by a guy who knows all the esoterica.
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You can drop by the Living Tree Music booth at the Topanga Banjo and Fiddle Contest on Sunday, May 19 and meet local tuthier Nowell Siegel to discuss any instrument questions / concerns you may have. Free estimates, and you can pick a free pick to take with you. Okay, picks are small. So Nowell will have his much more impressive Traveling Luthier tool kit. He can perform restringings or repairs right there at the festival, and he will donate 25% of his total repairs for the day back to the non-profit TBFC. More at www.LivingTreeMusic.com and www.TopangaFiddleBanjo.org.
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#4 story:
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ARTISTWORKS brings big some big names in Bluegrass-Americana to its online offerings
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We recently became acquainted with ArtistWorks (www.artistworks.com). It’s worth a look. Sure, they have clever marketing, but if the people they have recruited to offer p rograms and instruction are the measure of the enterprise, the substance is there, too.
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They have a “Guitar Campus,” a “Bass Campus,” and a virtual campus for just about any instrument, along with a “Bluegrass Academy,” the latter boasting a stable of instructors that include TONY TRISHKA and MISSY RAINES.
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Check out Missy Raines’ “DOUBLE BASS LESSONS: SUPPORTING THE SOLOIST,” at http://artistworks.com/blog/double-bass-lessons-supporting-soloist?utm_campaign=newsletter&utm_source=hubspot_email_marketing&utm_medium=email&utm_content=8090193&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_txmJiIu02Y9wYs_cx4kTecaVzUweMcEpOAN9G36-4nMFcDNAvE_hHHSAkz7XH-KyhSKJGnYdGzZ0Hgo0eZqy0MTPJ0g&_hsmi=8090193
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In this sample video from Missy Raines' online double bass lessons, she shows what a bass player can do to embellish what the other musicians are playing. Missy explains that whether it's the vocalist singing a melody or another instrument playing the lead, there are lots of different options you should know to create a dynamic within the song. Your role as the bass player is to be a team player, so you should think about things you can play that will make the lead voice sound good. She adds, “Playing bass is often a selfless experience, it's not about you! This is a big pill to swallow for some bassists, but it's a really important lesson to learn.”
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You can also watch “BANJO TUNING WITH TONY TRISCHKA” at http://artistworks.com/blog/banjo-tuning-tony-trischka?utm_campaign=newsletter&utm_source=hubspot_email_marketing&utm_medium=email&utm_content=8090193&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_fXISbbY7-yqsKptJJWO5wBeXxMAlIN0DIBoz9kAfrBprKZobr7ExV6_8OpzbZ38P3qloBQdmHNRh3vw-3UyoQuoSN4g&_hsmi=8090193
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These lessons include some aphorisms and basics, like, “For anyone learning how to play banjo, or any instrument for that matter, the importance of being in tune cannot be overstated. It won't matter how good your banjo rolls are or how fast you can run through a banjo scale - if you're not in tune you won't sound good. It's just that simple. So before you get ahead of yourself, take a moment to learn some basic banjo tuning.”
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It is certainly sound advice. Check out their site, www.artistworks.com. They have quite a stable of prominent players covering a vast array of instruments.
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#5 story:
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PULITZER PRIZE for Music announced April 15
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The news on Monday of the 2013 Pulitzer Prizes was immediately lost in the wake of the bomb detonations at the Boston Marathon. Time to back-up and catch up with these important recognitions.
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First, everyone seems to know about the Pulitzers for some things – literature, journalism – but not for others. Seven pertain to arts and more specifically, music. Here’s a look at the music prize, something – and someone – you should know.
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THE PULITZER PRIZE FOR MUSIC is one of seven given in the arts. It went to CAROLINE SHAW for "Partita for 8 Voices." It’s celebrated as “a highly polished and inventive a cappella work uniquely embracing speech, whispers, sighs, murmurs, wordless melodies and novel vocal effects.” Shaw says on her website that she wrote the piece for the vocal octet ROOMFUL OF TEETH. It debuted on Roomful of Teeth's self-titled first release last October on New Amsterdam Records.
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Shaw writes of the four-part suite, "Partita is a simple piece. Born of a love of surface and structure, of the human voice, of dancing and tired ligaments, of music ..."
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It is the first Pulitzer for Shaw. The previous two prizes went to opera winners.
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Finalists for the music prize were AARON JAY KERNIS for "Pieces of Winter Sky," called “a luminous work that takes listeners into a mystical realm marked by taut expressive control and extraordinarily subtle changes of tone, texture and nuance.” It’s on Associated Music Publishers, Inc. And, WADADA LEO SMITH for "Ten Freedom Summers," a jazz work devoted to ten key moments in the history of civil rights in America. It’s on Cuneiform Records.
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Lawrence Wines & Tied to the Tracks.
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The ACOUSTIC AMERICANA MUSIC GUIDE endeavors to bring you NEWS and views of interest to artists everywhere, more specifically to musicians and the creative community, and music makers and fans of acoustic and Folk-Americana music, both traditional and innovative. We provide a wealth of resources, including a HUGE catalog of acoustic-friendly venues, and schedules of performances in Southern California venues large and small. We cover workshops and other events for artists and folks in the music industry, and all kids o’ things in the world of acoustic and Americana and accessible classical music. From washtub bass to musical spoons to oboe to viola to banjo to squeezebox, from Djangostyle to new-fangled-old-time string band music, from sweet Cajun fiddle to pre-bluegrass Appalachian mountain music to proto blues… The Acoustic Americana Music Guide. We’re on it.
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