Spotlight Events: Acoustic Americana Music Guide, October 14, 2011 edition

     

SATURDAY's Late Edition UPDATE!
   
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               SPOTLIGHT EVENTS
     
                         from THE ACOUSTIC AMERICANA MUSIC GUIDE
     
                                                                                          October 14, 2011 edition
     
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    Southern California – the region of our core coverage – has THE MOST live acoustic music performances of anyplace in the world! (Not a brag, just a FACT.)
    
That's amply demonstrated every week in THIS SECTION of the Guide,
our SPOTLIGHT EVENTS.
    
     
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PLUS, remember to check THIS WEEK’S NEWS FEATURES, October 14 edition, in its own section of the Guide!    
    
It's only a click away, at
http://acousticamericana.blogspot.com/2011/10/news-features-acoustic-americana-music_14.html     
    
    
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YES! This IS the late edition, with MUCH more...
    
        This edition of SPOTLIGHT EVENTS had to post before all the late-arriving events (a whole ARMADA of 'em) could be added. That held the url for THIS Saturday morning, October 15, update.
     
    
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                        Acoustic Americana Music Guide's
    
                                        SPOTLIGHT EVENTS
    
                                          Saturday, October 15 , 2011       
                                                      Late Edition, with many late Additions
    
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Ongoing, through October
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Daily, through Oct 31, FESTIVAL:
10 am-midnight “HALLOWEEN HARVEST FESTIVAL” has live music and lots more, at the Pierce College Farm Center, corner of Victory and Desoto in Woodland Hills. Organizers proclaim the event as “the largest Harvest Festival in all of Southern California,” and they've expanded this year to include a larger festival grounds and an expanded six-acre corn maze.
    The festival opens at 10 am and runs daily and every evening. Sundays-Thursdays, it closes at 10 pm, Fridays & Saturdays, 'til midnight.
    This is a big-deal event, and they've been doing it for years, so they're good at it. In addition to the live music and that giant Corn Maze, activities include a Hay Ride, Giant Slide, Jumpers, Petting Zoo, a Train Ride, Carousel, Pony Rides, Bumper Boats, daytime Haunted House, Cow Train, Bungee, Rock Wall Climb, Gemstone Mining, and there's an “Afterdark FrightFair Screampark” with nighttime Factory of Nightmares Haunted House, Creatures of the Corn Haunted Trail, nighttime Corn Maze, and something they're calling the “Insane Reaction.”
    They offer all kinds of “activity ticket” combinations, but basic admission, which includes entry, the Corn Maze, the Hay Ride, and a couple of activity tickets, is only $5. Anyone who rides the Metro Orange Line gets in free, and the station is just across the street (must show a paper Metro ticket with that day's date).
    There's more info at www.halloweenharvestfestival.com – www.FrightFair.com – www.PierceFarmCenter.com – or call them at 818-999-6300.
     
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Daily, through Oct 31, in Ventura County, FESTIVAL:
“UNDERWOOD FAMILY FARMS HARVEST FESTIVAL” runs weekends with music, weekdays without, and includes the annual “FOLK FESTIVAL”weekend Oct 8 & 9, and the Oct 22 & 23 “WESTERN HERITAGE” weekend, plus a big corn maze, lots of activities for kids, food, and more, all at Underwood Family Farms, in the countryside near Moorpark. More at www.underwoodfamilyfarms.com, or call them at 805-529-3690.
     
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Through Oct 16, various venues throughout L.A.; FESTIVAL:
Annual “WORLD FESTIVAL OF SACRED MUSIC” (www.festivalofsacredmusic.org) includes concerts as well as workshops for artists. Though most of it is “world music” that's rather “out there,” and not especially of interest to folk-Americana fans, the workshops are of broader interest. (A few that we think will interest you are in the Guide's listings on the days they occur; check the festival's site for the full offerings.) Plus, there are two fine concerts you should definitely consider: (1) Sat, Oct 8, 1 pm at the Autry Museum, and (2) Sat, Oct 15, at 7 pm at UCLA's Royce Hall; these shouldn't be lost in the deluge of the festival's 16-day, 32-event, 832-artist fare. See the Oct 8 & Oct 15 listings.    
     
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Through Oct 16, various venues throughout Pasadena; FESTIVAL:
Biennial “AxS FESTIVAL” (www.axsfestival.org) this time explores the themes of “Fire & Water” with two weeks of art, music, dance, theater, performance and “provocative conversation.” It's art and some very cool, very accessible science. (See the October 14 NEWS FEATURES for much more.)
     
     
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Saturday, October 15
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    SATURDAY brings THREE festival events in Pasadena. Starting at 11 am, there are two art fairs / street festivals with live music, and there's one more in early evening.
     
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Sat, Oct 15:
11 am to 4 pm, catch free performances by DUSTBOWL REVIVAL, THE JESSICA FICHOT BAND, and ORGONE, at the “ART OF FOOD / TASTE OF SOUTH LAKE FESTIVAL” on South Lake Avenue in Pasadena, a few blocks south of the 210 Freeway. In addition to the live music, there's food, live cooking demos, a wine and beer garden, and raffle prizes. It's a showcase, with food booths in the street, of South Lake's restaurants and businesses; it looks very much like the early years of the “Taste of Encino / Taste of Folk Music” event. Access to the whole enchilada is free, beyond that, it's pay-as-you-eat. More details on the South Lake website at www.southlakeavenue.org    
     
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Sat, Oct 15:
11 am-5 pm “ARTWALK” in Pasadena's Playhouse District, southeast of Old Town, along El Molino, in Pasadena. This one features live music, an open-air art fair, hands-on activities, a gallery walk, and more, all Schedules at www.PlayhouseDistrict.org/artwalk    
     
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Sat, Oct 15:
Noon-late “INTERNATIONAL BLUES CHALLENGE FINALS” starts at noon with the TITANIC DIXIELAND JAZZ BAND, followed by the “International Battle of the Bands Finals” at The Arcadia Blues Club, 16 E Huntington Dr, Arcadia 91006; 626-447-9349.
    It's quite a coup, landing the finals for the International Blues Challenge. And while it may not – yet – have built the heavyweight rep of the great blues palaces in Memphis, the Arcadia Blues Club, just east of Pasadena, regularly books the same acts when they tour, plus first-rate West Coast blues acts.    
    This Saturday, they're starting at noon with the TITANIC DIXIELAND JAZZ BAND, and the “International Battle of the Bands Finals” competition gets underway at 6 pm.     
    Proprietor BOBBY BLUEHOUSE and his club have a loyal Friday and Saturday night following, and any given weekend, you need to book dinner reservations to get a table (current bar specials are $2 PBR, and $2 and $3 shots).     
    Upcoming shows, some still to be announced, include new or return engagements with JAMES INTVELD, PHIL ALVIN, BB CHUNG KING & THE BUDDAHEADS, ERIC SARDINAS, ANDY WALO (WHO PLAYS HERE FRIDAY NIGHT), SIN TWINS, DAVID BENNETT COHEN, COREY STEVENS, ROD PIAZZA & THE MIGHTY FLYERS, KETTLEBLACK, FINIS TASBY, DON & DEWEYS, RON ELLINGTON SHY, KAYE BOHLER, IGNITE THE BOREALIS, KING TIME, THE AMERICANS, KINGTIME, RENO JONES, KAL DAVID, and SUGAR BLUE.
    You can buy advance tickets online (for this Saturday or any of their shows – full calendar on their site) and save the $5 ticket fee, at www.arcadiabluesclub.com.  There's more at www.facebook.com/ArcadiaBluesClub  
    
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Sat, Oct 15:
5 to 9 pm “ARTRHYTHM” at Paseo Colorado, Pasadena's indoor/outdoor shopping/eating complex, adjacent to Old Town Pasadena on Colorado Bl. It's a world-music celebration of drumming traditions from Japan to Africa, and you can dance under the stars (well, the lights, anyway) in the samba and salsa concert finale. Details at www.PaseoColoradoPasadena.com    
     
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Sat, Oct 15:
4 to 9 pm “RETURN OF THE FORK” music party at David Smith Construction, 2353 Kellogg Court, in Altadena. (Near Fair Oaks & Woodbury, just west of Altadena Cemetery; the same place has another address, at 2353 Fair Oaks). There will be food, drink, and live music supplied by The Coffee Gallery Backstage.
    Reprinted below is the News Feature from this week's edition of the Guide's news:
    It's The Great Fork, Charlie Brown, just in time for the pumpkins. The iconic “Fork In The Road,” a giant silver fork sculpture, got global media attention following its guerrilla installation and six months' display at the forking intersection of St. John’s Place and Pasadena Avenue, near Bellefontaine in Pasadena.    
    The Fork is on the verge of permanent return and enshrinement, and there is an appropriate amount of accompanying hoopla.  
    It begins this Saturday, October 15. There will be food, drink, and live music supplied by The Coffee Gallery Backstage.    
    Forkian guru BOB STANE adds, “In the spirit of 'barn raising,' guests are asked to bring a covered dish to add the the festivities. Burgers and hot dogs supplied by the hosts. Forks included. Bring a camera as photo ops of folks riding The Fork will be obvious. The Fork will have a saddle and be horizontal. The good times never end.”    
    To add to the art theme, internationally known artist ZOFIA KOSTYRKO has designed a T-shirt to memorialize the event. And yes, Bob & Ken will autograph the shirts as requested.  
    Who, you ask, is Ken? He's the artist and former owner of the Coffee Gallery bistro, the guy who originally designed and built The Fork as a birthday surprise for his Coffee Gallery Backstage partner, Bob Stane. Approximately 18 vertical feet of silvery glory, the Fork mysteriously appeared on Bob’s birthday two years ago, towering over traffic at what will soon be re-designated as Fork Plaza.     
    Seems Bob had once mused to Ken, when coming to a fork in the road, definitely take one path, and that a fork in the road deserved a FORK in the road to identify it, like a Warner Brothers cartoon. That was all it took to secretly get Ken started. Before long, unknown thousands of drivers had their daily commutes enlightened by Ken's outsized realization of Bob's casual remark.     
    The original installation followed the old adage that it's better to ask forgiveness than permission, and the Fork's instant celebrity created a cult of Forkians who quickly broke local records by holding a Thanksgiving food drive for the needy at the Fork. It became too politically hot for the city to pull it down. Still, issues of public safety were invariably cited, despite thye Fork's hefty concrete base, clandestinely poured in the middle of the night.     
    The Fork did come down, with a promise the city would find a way to put it back. Not everyone was pleased. Some recalled similar promises from Los Angeles when the Angel's Flight inclined railway was dismantled and sat in storage for a generation, then when it was returned, only to be “temporarily” taken out of service for nearly a decade.     
    Pasadena politicians happily did much better. The Fork was removed and refurbished to meet the engineering standards of the city. A new concrete footing was installed. As Bob says, “After a year’s vacation in Oz, where it was brushed and polished by Munchkins and milk maids until it gleamed,” the Fork will rise again.    
    This time, “It has the blessings of the entire city government of Pasadena, which has embraced public art with enthusiasm,” says Bob, adding, “The gigantic piece of table cutlery returns to its rightful place at the [same] intersection, now known as Fork Plaza.”    
    Ken says, “It is now permitted and has the blessings of all. Hats off to the City Of Pasadena and its government.”     
    Bob smiles, “Art, with tongue-in-cheek, lives in The Crown City.”    
    Saturday's music party and Gathering of the Forkians is free. Bob says, “There will be a sly fund raising to cover future expenses of The Fork, but all donations are low key and voluntary. Feel free to bring a beverage in a bottle to help launch The Fork into posterity. The entire Fork In The Road Gang will be at the party, wearing name tags. They are available to answer questions about their part in The Great Fork Adventure.”    
    Last we knew, Bob was still looking for a saddle and reins for Saturday's “Ride the Fork” photo op. See if he found one, find pictures of the Fork, and learn more in the detailed “show and tell” at www.theforkintheroadgang.com. (Questions, call Ken Marshall at 626-712-9620.)  
    You'll also find info on the free “Fork Raising” event that will happen Friday, October 21 at 11 am, at Fork Plaza. Musician / Actor / “Official Singing Cowboy of Burbank” WILL RYAN has (somehow) procured a proclamation from the League of Nations (via time machine, no doubt) declaring it to be “International Fork Day.” Will and his band, THE CACTUS COUNTY COWBOYS, play their CD release show that night at the Coffee Gallery Backstage, and if you bring and “show your fork” that night, you get a $3-per-ticket discount. (And you thought the spoon was the most valuable piece of silverware.) May the Fork be with you.
     
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Sat, Oct 15:
3-5 pm Workshop: “COUNTRY BLUES WITH ALICE STUART & PAT TENNIS” at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. Learn some of the fingerpicking techniques blues great Alice Stuart uses with her superb fingerstyle blues. Plus, Pat Tennis will teach you tips on how to bach up and support the lead player. Alice has played with Van Morrison, Zappa, and Bloomfield, and toured the national and international circuits. She blends blues and good country music (not the Nashville pop junk) and she performs with style, finesse, and great humor. Alice also does an 8 pm concert tonight at the venue; see listing. Workshop fee, $35.
     
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Sat, Oct 15:
6 pm-late “INTERNATIONAL BLUES CHALLENGE FINALS” at The Arcadia Blues Club, 16 E Huntington Dr, Arcadia 91006; 626-447-9349.
    It's quite a coup, landing the finals for the International Blues Challenge. And while it may not – yet – have built the heavyweight rep of the great blues palaces in Memphis, the Arcadia Blues Club, just east of Pasadena, regularly books the same acts when they tour, plus first-rate West Coast blues acts.    
    This Saturday, they're starting at noon with the TITANIC DIXIELAND JAZZ BAND, and the “International Battle of the Bands Finals” competition gets underway at 6 pm.     
    Proprietor BOBBY BLUEHOUSE and his club have a loyal Friday and Saturday night following, and any given weekend, you need to book dinner reservations to get a table (current bar specials are $2 PBR, and $2 and $3 shots).     
    Upcoming shows, some still to be announced, include new or return engagements with JAMES INTVELD, PHIL ALVIN, BB CHUNG KING & THE BUDDAHEADS, ERIC SARDINAS, ANDY WALO (WHO PLAYS HERE FRIDAY NIGHT), SIN TWINS, DAVID BENNETT COHEN, COREY STEVENS, ROD PIAZZA & THE MIGHTY FLYERS, KETTLEBLACK, FINIS TASBY, DON & DEWEYS, RON ELLINGTON SHY, KAYE BOHLER, IGNITE THE BOREALIS, KING TIME, THE AMERICANS, KINGTIME, RENO JONES, KAL DAVID, and SUGAR BLUE.
    You can buy advance tickets online (for this Saturday or any of their shows – full calendar on their site) and save the $5 ticket fee, at www.arcadiabluesclub.com.  There's more at www.facebook.com/ArcadiaBluesClub  
    
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Sat, Oct 15:
7 pm INCENDIO plays the Coffee Gallery Backstage, 2029 N Lake Av, Altadena 92675; reservations, 626-798-6236.
    INCENDIO is an acclaimed world-guitar-fusion trio. in both Italian and Spanish means “fire” and this moniker is fitting for a musical group whose sound is all about energy, exploration, and passion. At the heart of INCENDIO’s sound is the Latin or Spanish guitar which can conjure up romantic as well as powerful and bold images – they refer to their style as “Latin Guitar World Fusion”.
    Averaging over 150 concerts a year for the last four years, INCENDIO’s live show has become an explosive improvisatory journey, garnering tremendous audience response in such diverse venues as the Strawberry Music Fest in Yosemite, the Sundance Film Festival, Verizon Music Festival, Catalina Jazztrax, California World Festival, and many more. Their four previous CD’s have enjoyed international radio airplay and critical acclaim.
    Their new live DVD and CD, “Dia Y Noche”, captures a daytime show at the Strawberry Festival 2004 and a nighttime show at the Countrywide Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Center and was released internationally on December 2, 2005. INCENDIO is Jim Stubblefield (guitar), Liza Carbe (bass and guitar), and Jean-Pierre Durand (guitar). Tix, $20.
    
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Sat, Oct 15, in Pasadena:
7-10 pm “BRAD COLERICK'S WINESTYLES REUNION SHOW” at Heritage Wine Co., 155 N Raymond Av, Pasadena (next to The Armory); a city parking lot is just to the north of Heritage with 90 minutes free. Appetizers and light menu items available.
    Brad says, “This Saturday, October 15 – so many reasons to celebrate, my head may explode! Go for an early dinner at Firefly then hop on the Metro to Old Town Pasadena (Memorial Park station) and join us for the fun.
•  WineStyles reunion show with Kathy & Mark.
•  2 year celebration of the Wine & Song series with many W&S alums performing.
•  Debut of the new Wine & Song - Volume 1 compilation CD. - Advance orders wil be taken.
•  Welcoming Léal Vineyards back as our official Wine & Song sponsor.
•  A weekend show for those of you who can't make it out mid-week.
No cover, free show. Brad adds, “Advance purchase of the CD is encouraged but not mandatory. CDs are $10 but if you contribute $25 you'll get a "special thanks to..." in the credits. If you want to contribute but can't make it to the show, go to:  http://wineandsong.com/cd  And thanks for the support. “ - Brad.    
    
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Sat, Oct 15:
“WEST VALLEY MUSIC CONCERT SERIES” season opener, with performing songwriters & touring artists JAMES HURLEY, LISA NEMZO, RASPIN STUWART, at West Valley Music Center, 24424 Vanowen St, West Hills (half a block W of Valley Circle Bl, 3 miles N of the Ventura Fwy.); 818-992-4142.
West Valley Music Center in the SFV's West Hills. As Trough Records chair MARK HUMPHREYS observes, “Jeff presents some of the best local and touring singer-songwriters in an excellent, laid back listening room setting.”    
    Saturday's season opener brings three headliners to share the evening. JAMES HURLEY tours almost constantly and enjoys airplay on many indie and college radio stations. His originals have depth and his voice and guitar are both superior.
    Touring artist LISA NEMZO – or rather, her smashed guitar – have been featured the past few months on the opening page of acousticmusic.net. (The utter destruction of her expensive signature instrument at the hands of American Airlines is presented in horrifying photos, and the operators of tin birds and the truck that ran over her supposedly bombproof case have yet to make good on their wanton negligence.)
    Joining James and Lisa is RASPIN STUWART, the artist who recently performed with bluesman HUGH LAURIE (TV's Doctor “House”); Raspin is the former longtime publisher of Boulevard Magazine, and he's building a solid rep of late as a formidable musician.    
    JEFF GOLD, the venue's proprietor and booker, is a renowned musician who co-wrote with
    Details of the show, including show time, their new season's concert schedule, and their open mics is at www.westvalleymusiccenter.com.  Saturday's show is $15 per person, and refreshments are included.    
    
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Sat, Oct 15:
8 pm ALICE STUART plays Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. She's played with Van Morrison, Zappa, and Bloomfield, and toured the national and international circuits. She blends blues and good country music (not the Nashville pop junk) and she performs with style, finesse, and great humor. She also does a 3-5 pm workshop today at the venue; see listing. Concert tix, $15.
     
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Sat, Oct 15:
8 pm GRAMMY-winning guitar icons STEVE TROVATO and CARL VERHEYEN at the Fret House, 309 N Citrus Av, Covina; 626-339-7020; www.frethouse.com.  
     
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Sat, Oct 15, in OC:
“LORD OF THE RINGS IN CONCERT” is a big-deal, full symphonic production at the Honda Center, 2695 E Katella Av, Anaheim 92806; www.hondacenter.com; tix 714-704-2500. (Note: Parking here is $15-$40.) In the manner of the “Stars Wars in Concert” tour, this one performs the music of the “Rings” trilogy. While the films were silly, the soundtracks were quite good, so this should make for a fine evening – if you can take the fanatics dressed like characters from the stories.
     
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Sat, Oct 15:
OPERAWORKS brings “THE NEWEST RECITAL IN THE WORLD,” at the Boston Court Performing Arts Center, 70 N Mentor Av, Pasadena 91106; tix and info, including discount and bonus packages, are available at www.bostoncourt.com or 626-683-6883. The OperaWorks ensemble will invent a custom recital right in front of your eyes, with made-to-order music, at your request. It's entirely improvised, with arias, duets, trios, and scenes with improvised accompaniment, all performed without any prepared or printed music.
     
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Sunday, October 16
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Sun, Oct 16:
11 am PETER ALSOP plays a Kids Matinee concert at McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497;
    
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Sun, Oct 16:
Noon-3 pm “SONGSALIVE! ANNUAL MUSIC PICNIC” at Sherman Oaks Park, 14201 Huston Street (off Hazeltine), Sherman Oaks 91423. Look for the Songsalive! banner under a shady tree near the Pool/Main entrance off Huston Street. There's a map at http://tinyurl.com/directionsshermanoakspark    
    Members of Songsalive!, other musicians, and their friends and families, will meet to eat and make music in Sherman Oaks. Songsalive! - their name includes the exclamation point – is an international nonprofit created by and for songwriters and performing musicians. In addition to their annual conference and co-sponsorship of many industry events, their monthly seminars and performance events in many places around the world, they have a lot of fun performing with and for each other. This Sunday is their annual Los Angeles-area “SONGSALIVE! SONG-MUSIC CIRCLE FALL PICNIC” where musicians and songwriters can get together and have a casual music and song circle. They add, “Others welcome of course.”    
    Gilli Moon, Songsalive! President, and Dave Harvey, the organization's Executive Director, issued a joint statement saying, “This is where we can jam together, present live songs and lock into making relationships with others in our group. Also a great way to ask questions about Songsalive! and how we can help you with your songs.”    
    Founded in 1997, Songsalive! (www.songsalive.org) has become the largest international non-profit organization dedicated to nurturing, support, education and promotion of songwriters and composers, with worldwide chapters and a new social network.    
    The Picnic is sponsored by Noisy Planet (www.noisyplanet.net), an indie artist showcase and music career development site, who is donating a Premium Artist Package to a lucky Songsalive! member who attends the Picnic. The package includes a dedicated showcase page on noisyplanet.net, digital distribution of one album to top online retailers including iTunes, plus 100 full-color promo cards and guaranteed spins on internet radio.    
    Bring your own picnic lunch and food to share, picnic blankets, instruments (no power at the stage). Guitars, percussion, voices are the emphasis, and all are welcome.
     
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Sun, Oct 16:
1-6 pm “ARTPERFORMANCE: OLD PASADENA'S CULTURAL DANCE FESTIVAL” in Old Town Pasadena. It's dance and cuisine from around the globe, featuring dance from Russia, East India, the Himalayan region, Polynesia, Mexico, and more. Details and venues at www.OldPasadena.org    
     
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Sun, Oct 16:
3 pm TISHTONES & SYLVIA COTTON SINGERS perform as part of the “WORLD FESTIVAL OF SACRED MUSIC,” with this show at Beth Shir Shalom, 1827 California Av, Santa Monica 90403; 310-453-3361.
    
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Sun, Oct 16:
5-9 pm “MESSAROUND” is an eclectic hodge-podge, today featuring the atmospheric aural acrobatics of Dick Deluxe's GOTHIC SOUTH, high-voltage E.L.A. teen R&B-punk thrillers THE SHAG RATS, garage trash thugs THEE TEEPEES and high-falutin' honky-tonk rockers THE CHEATIN' KIND, plus THE MESSAROUND TABERNACLE CHOIR, plus special guests, all at Viva Cantina, 900 W Riverside Dr, Burbank; www.vivacantina.com;  818-845-2425. No cover, no age limit.  
    
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Sun, Oct 16:
7 pm KAYE RODDEN plays the Coffee Gallery Backstage, 2029 N Lake Av, Altadena 92675; reservations, 626-798-6236.
    
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Sun, Oct 16:
SOLD OUT: 7 pm JENNY LEWIS at McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497.
    
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Sun, Oct 16, in Lakeside:
7:30 pm TERRY HOLDER, the Alaska-based singer-songwriter, plays the Dark Thirty House Concert Series in Lakeside 92040; reservations get directions at 619-443-9622.
    
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Sun, Oct 16:
“TRACKING FILM AND TELEVISION MUSIC: AN AFTERNOON WITH LEE HOLDRIDGE & JON BURLINGAME,” at the Boston Court Performing Arts Center, 70 N Mentor Av, Pasadena 91106; tix and info, including discount and bonus packages, are available at www.bostoncourt.com or 626-683-6883. World renowned author and lecturer JON BURLINGAME helps to see and hear this astonishing and precise world when he and Emmy and Grammy award winning composer LEE HOLDRIDGE (the late JOHN DENVER's orchestra leader and collaborator) discuss, from the composers perspective, music composed for the big and little screens. Live musical performances and selected clips from Mr. Holdridge’s extensive catalogue of his film and television scores are interspersed throughout this fascinating, behind the scenes look at the music behind the magic.
    
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Sun, Oct 16:
8 pm CLIFF WAGNER & THE OLD #7 play “dead-on bluegrass in honor of Charles Saltzman's Birthday” at the Cinema Bar, 3967 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City; www.thecinemabar.com. No cover, but contribute to the artists' tip jar. More at www.oldnumber7.net    
    
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Sun, Oct 16:
8 pm monthly “VARIETY NIGHT” with featured artists SABRINA & CRAIG and the sign-up-in-advance OPEN MIC, at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. SABRINA & CRAIG won the 2010 Topanga Banjo Fiddle Singing competition. Open Mic signups limited to the first eight, and are now being taken at the venue. Tix, $4.
    
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Sun, Oct 16, in San Marcos:
8 pm SARAH McQUAID plays the Frogstop House Concert series in San Marcos 92078.
     
     
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Monday, October 17
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Mon, Oct 17:
7-9 pm “SQUEAKY WHEEL TOUR” LIVE ACOUSTIC SHOW at West L.A. Music, 11345 Santa Monica Bl, L.A. 90025; 310-477-1945; www.westlamusic.com. The tour has one L.A. date. If you plan to attend, RSVP so you're guaranteed to get in: www.westlamusic.com/squeakywheel    
    Kidnap survivor ELIZABETH SMART joins musicians on a music tour with a message for a West L.A. event. The tour and the organization behind it are all about bringing home missing people.    
    Soon after her musician sister vanished after a gig – without a trace – musician JANEL RAPP founded a nonprofit organization and a concert tour with ever-changing artists, called the “SQUEAKY WHEEL TOUR.” It's an obvious reference to the old cliché that the squeaky wheel gets the grease – or the attention. Janel's organization, “Gina for Missing Persons,” is credited with a key role in bringing thousands of missing persons back to their loved ones. The concert tour is its chief instrument.    
    About once a year, sometimes every other year, the tour lands in L.A. for a date. It always brings different artists and bands, some local, some from elsewhere in the nation or the world, and almost always with Janel among them. This time, the musicians will share the stage with brave kidnap survivor ELIZABETH SMART, who was stolen in Utah from her bedroom as a young teen. Elizabeth has made limited appearances since getting her life back and returning to her family – who never gave up searching for her and keeping the public aware to look for her. She is articulate and compelling, as you know if you have heard her speak.
     
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Mon, Oct 17:
7:30 pm “BLUEGRASS NIGHT” with THE BROMBIES and CORNSTAR at Viva Fresh Cantina, 900 W Riverside Dr, Burbank; www.vivacantina.com; 818-845-2425.
    Rosin up your bow for this happy hootenanny, featuring a set from CORNSTAR, plus open jams in the Cantina and on both patios, plus plenty of tempting food and drink specials, 8 pm.
    In the Riverside Rancho Room, there's more choice bluegrass courtesy of renowned local favorites THE BROMBIES, 7:30 pm. No Cover, no age limit, acres of free parking across the street at Pickwick Gardens.
     
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Mon, Oct 17:
8 pm “AN EVENING WITH THOMAS DOLBY” at the Grammy Museum’s Clive Davis Sound Stage, 800 W Olympic Bl (entrance on Figueroa), L.A. 90015; www.grammymuseum.org;  213-765-6803.   
    He's the iconic '80s star whose hits “She Blinded Me With Science” and “Hyperactive” helped define the MTV generation/revolution. The five-time Grammy-nominated British artist quit the music business in the early ’90s and spent many years in Silicon Valley. Dolby will break his 20-year silence with a new release titled “A Map of the Floating City.”
    The album, featuring appearances by special guest artists MARK KNOPFLER, REGINA SPEKTOR, NATALIE MacMASTER, BRUCE WOOLLEY and IMOGEN HEAP, will be available on October 25 on Lost Toy People Records as a regular and hi-res download, physical CD and in a special Deluxe Edition featuring a second disc of instrumentals and bonus tracks.
    Hear Dolby in discussion about his celebrated career, current success and his newest album. After an interview with GRAMMY Museum Executive Director Bob Santelli, Dolby will take audience questions and perform a selection of songs from the new CD. Advance tickets are $25; doors at 7:30 pm.
     
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Tuesday, October 18
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Tue, Oct 18:
7-10 pm SPECIAL ONE-YEAR ANNIVERSARY SHOW for the weekly “J.C. HYKE'S SONGWRITERS SERENADE” showcase at Matt Denny's Ale House Restaurant & Bar, 145 E Huntington Dr, Arcadia 91006. Different recording artists take part in an invitational showcase.
     
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Tue, Oct 18:
7:30 pm “REEL TO REAL” series season debut with the intriguing new documentary “THE ORIGINAL 7VEN” at the Grammy Museum’s Clive Davis Sound Stage, 800 W Olympic Bl (entrance on Figueroa), L.A. 90015; www.grammymuseum.org;  213-765-6803.   
    Admission is $10 and all proceeds benefit The GRAMMY Museum. (The Original 7ven will be live in concert at Club Nokia on October 19.)
     
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Tue, Oct 18:
8 pm SUSAN WERNER plays the Smothers Theatre at Pepperdine Univ., Malibu, 24255 P.C.H., Malibu 90265; 310-506-4522.
     
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Tue, Oct 18:
8 pm “WATER IS RISING: MUSIC AND DANCE AMID CLIMATE CHANGE” performed by artists from the Pacific atolls of Kiribati, Tokelau, & Tuvalu, at University Theatre, UC Riverside, 400 Humanities, Riverside 92521. With 36 artists from these Pacific atols presenting song and dance, it's safe to say, If you enjoy Hawaiian music, you'll love this. And it will bring you face-to-face with the reality of climate change and rising sea levels. This show may sell-out. Info, www.waterisrising.com
     
Tue, Oct 18:
8 pm weekly “TRADITIONAL IRISH MUSIC SESSION” at Timmy Nolan's Tavern and Grill, 10111 Riverside Dr, Toluca Lake 91602; 818-985-3359.
     
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Tue, Oct 18:
8 pm weekly “BOURBON AND BLUEGRASS” at South Santa Monica Sports Bar and Grill, 3001 Wilshire Bl, Santa Monica, 90403; 310- 828-9988.
     
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Tue, Oct 18:
8 pm weekly “BLUEGRASS JAM” at Viva Fresh Cantina, 900 Riverside Dr, Burbank 91506; 818-515-4444.
     
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Wednesday, October 19
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Wed, Oct 19:
7:15 pm PAUL SIMON and THE SECRET SISTERS play the Gibson Amphitheatre at Universal CityWalk, 100 Universal City Plaza, Universal City 91602; 818-622-4440.
     
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Wed, Oct 19:
8 pm TIM GRIMM and THE SWEET POTATOES play the Coffee Gallery Backstage, 2029 N Lake Av, Altadena 92675; reservations, 626-798-6236.
    TIM GRIMM was named 2000’s “Best Discovery in Roots/Americana Music” by The Chicago Sun-Times, and “2004 Male Artist of The Year” by the Freeform American Roots Deejays. Tim's recording, “The Back Fields,” was named “Best Americana Album” in the 2006 “Just Plain Folks Music Awards” in Los Angeles (the largest and most diverse music awards in the world). His songs and performances have established him as a unique voice in Americana music.
    Tim has toured and recorded with his friend, RAMBLIN’ JACK ELLIOTT, appeared with HARRISON FORD in the film “Clear and Present Danger,” and has shared the stage with writer and poet WENDELL BERRY.     
    Each of TIM GRIMM's past four recordings have reached the top of the Folk or American-roots charts. Grimm walks the fine line between folk and country, while maintaining a strong footing in tradition. We hear the rural rumblings that have shaped his life, but we are also invited to share a bigger picture, as evident in so much of his work. Critics searching for comparisons most often cite Johnny Cash, Woody Guthrie and (“Nebraska” era) Bruce Springsteen. Tim is not only an award-winning songwriter, but an award-winning actor on stage and screen.     
    Tim's discography includes “Heart Land” (2000), “Coyote’s Dream” (2003), “Names” (2004), “The Back Fields” (2005), “Holding Up The World” (2008) and “Farm Songs” (2010).     
    As a highly successful actor, Tim has filmed three major motion pictures this past year, including “The Express” with Dennis Quaid. And he still makes time to tour and perform his music.    
    OPENING ACT and special guests are THE SWEET POTATOES, the duo of LAURA HALL & KELLY MacLEOD. Laura is best known as the improvisational pianist on NPR's “Whose Line Is it Anyway?” Kelly was born and raised in Shreveport, Louisiana and has spent the last 20 years in L.A. where she recorded two albums with Warner Brothers, produced by EDDIE VAN HALEN. The two started singing together at their church, and on various studio and live projects. Their musical collaboration really began when Laura’s husband, Rick, was putting together his indie film, “Slice of Pie,” He cast Kelly as the female lead, and had Laura compose the score and they clicked. THE SWEET POTATOES are currently recording their first CD.
    TIxs are $15.
     
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Wed, Oct 19:
8 pm “AN EVENING WITH STEVIE NICKS,” in a special benefit for the GRAMMY Museum and the GRAMMY Foundation, presented by American Express, at the Grammy Museum’s Clive Davis Sound Stage, 800 W Olympic Bl (entrance on Figueroa), L.A. 90015; www.grammymuseum.org;  213-765-6803.   
    Multi-GRAMMY Award-winning STEVIE NICKS has been acclaimed as “Rock and roll's greatest poet by CYNTHIA FOX of KLOS. As a member of the legendary FLEETWOOD MAC as well as her extraordinary solo career, Nicks is one of the world’s most influential and inspiring artists of the last three decades. For an audience of 200 in the Clive Davis Theater, Nicks will converse with GRAMMY Museum Executive Director Bob Santelli about her history-making career and her current CD, “In Your Dreams,” her first studio album in a decade. After the discussion, Nicks will take audience questions and perform a few songs. Doors open at 7:30 pm. American Express advance tickets are $50 and can be purchased at the Museum Box Office (American Express ticket purchasers receive a special gift). Public sale begins Saturday, October 15, at noon.
     
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Wed, Oct 19:
6:30 pm “BRENDAN'S IRISH MUSIC SESSION” at Brendan’s Irish Pub and Restaurant, 1755 E Daily Dr, Camarillo 93010; 888-811-5818. Runs first & third Wednesday, every month.
     
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Wed, Oct 19:
7 pm weekly OPEN MIC at the Talking Stick, 1411 Lincoln Bl, Venice 92091. Signups at 6:45 pm.
     
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Wed, Oct 19, in Ventura County:
7:30 pm Songmakers weekly “SIMI VALLEY HOOT at a private residence in Simi Valley; contact Songmakers for location, at www.songmakers.org    
     
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Wed, Oct 19:
8 pm “GUITAROLOGY” weekly showcase and open mic, at Bar Melody and Grill, 9132 S Sepulveda Bl, Los Angeles 90045; 310-670-1994.
     
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Wed, Oct 19:
8 pm weekly “IRISH MUSIC SESSION” at O'Brien's Irish Pub and Restaurant, 2226 Wilshire Bl, Santa Monica 90403; 310-829-5303.
     
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Wed, Oct 19:
9 pm weekly “ACOUSTIC CORDIALE” showcase, with different recording artists each week, playing acoustic, at Café Cordiale, 14015 Ventura Bl, Sherman Oaks 91423; 818-789-1985.
     
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Thursday, October 20
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Thu, Oct 20, in Riverside:
TOM RUSSELL plays All Saints' Episcopal Church, 3847 Terracina Dr, Riverside 92506. Info and reservations, FrConrad@gmail.com   
    
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Thu, Oct 20:
7:30 pm “SONGWRITING LEGENDS-IN-THE-ROUND” at the Grammy Museum’s Clive Davis Sound Stage, 800 W Olympic Bl (entrance on Figueroa), L.A. 90015; www.grammymuseum.org;  213-765-6803.   
    The Songwriters Hall of Fame, in association with the GRAMMY Museum, presents a “SONGWRITING LEGENDS-IN-THE-ROUND” event at the Museum's Clive Davis Theater. An intimate audience of 200 will hear a stellar gathering of “Songwriters Hall of Fame” inductees discussing their careers and performing their songs. They are JEFF BARRY (“Chapel Of Love,” ”I Honestly Love You,” “Be My Baby”), CHARLES FOX ("Killing Me Softly,” “Happy Days,” “Ready To Take A Chance Again”), ALBERT HAMMOND ("It Never Rains In California,” “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now,” “To All The Girls I’ve Loved Before”) and BILL WITHERS ("Lean On Me,” “Ain’t No Sunshine,” “Just The Two Of Us”). Songwriters Hall of Fame Chairman and inductee JIMMY WEBB will kick off the evening with welcoming remarks. Doors open at 7 pm. Admission is $20. Tickets can be purchased online now at Ticketmaster.com. All proceeds benefit The GRAMMY Museum and The Songwriters Hall of Fame.
    
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Thu, Oct 20:
8 pm DRIFTWOOD FIRE plays the Coffee Gallery Backstage, 2029 N Lake Av, Altadena 92675; reservations, 626-798-6236.
    This pair of women won “first place in this year's Merle Fest Chris Austin Songwriting contest, first place in the International Narrative Song Contest, Suggested Artists” status in VH-1’s “Song of the Year” contest, and an Honorable Mention at the Telluride Troubadour Contest.
    Nick Smith, co-producer of the Caltech Folk Music Society series says, “If you haven’t heard them perform live yet, I highly recommend this show. The ONLY reason I’m not going and paying to hear them again is that I will already be at the FAR-West conference up in Eugene. Their guitar-banjo accompaniment on modern originals is fascinating, and their vocals are exceptionally clean. Good songwriting, too, and you know what my standards are like.”
    They recently got a big write up, and photo, in “Pasadena Now.” DRIFTWOOD FIRE, says venue impresario BOB STANE, “is a rarity in today’s media mad world – an organically creative female duo whose vivid songwriting and prodigious playing skills display uncommon artistry.”     Others observe that they are, “Striking for their balance of variety and seamlessness, and for exceptional storytelling/”
    The duo's captivating live performance have propelled them to the stages of the National Women’s Music Festival, the Rocky Mountain Folks Fest, Falcon Ridge Emerging Artists showcase and Far-West Folk Alliance Premier showcases.
    “We love writing and performing and want to give people an experience that slows down time a bit and encourages them to sit back and catch their breath” says Scharf, “and maybe find a part of themselves in this music, like we did.” Tix, $15.
     
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Friday, October 21
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Fri, Oct 21:
7:30 pm CLARENCE TREAT, an Original NEW CHRISTY MINSTREL, plus BUFFALO BILL BOYCOTT & THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN EXPRESS, play a benefit for the Occidental College Choral Department presented by the college's Alumni Association, at Occidental College in Herrick Chapel, 1600 Campus Rd, L.A. 90042; reservations, 323-259-2601 or http://alumni.oxy.edu/glee_club_benefit2011.    
    Clarence and Bill performed together in the New Christy Minstrels and recently played their new show to packed houses in Wyoming. It was so much fun Clarence knew he had to share it with his Oxy and church choir friends, hence there's one date at each place, and both are benefit shows.
    “The whole family will love the banjo and fiddle playing, ballads, humorous cowboy poetry, yodeling (not to be missed!), poignant Native American Story Telling and original songs.” - Kemmerer [WY] Gazette, February 3, 2011. Additional quotes:
    “Joanne Orr, Buffalo Bill Boycott and Clarence Treat put on a great show….”
    “A feverish excitement erupted over Hank Williams’ ‘Jambalaya’, moving people to sing along, clapping loudly and tapping their feet.”
    “…entertaining fans with jokes, history lessons, story telling and their own life experiences. The crowd hung on to their every word.”
    "Treat made everyone’s eyes water with heartfelt tracks like 'Lights of Cheyenne' and 'Scarlet Ribbons,' from his album 'Songs I Love to Sing.'”
    They tour a lot, but don't often get to Southern California. Tix: adults $20; all students $10,
     
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Fri, Oct 21, in San Diego:
7:30 pm TOM RUSSELL plays the AMSD Concert Series, 4650 Mansfield St, San Diego 92116; 619-303-8176.
    Received at press time, we scrambled to add this. Tom Russell is making his “Mesabi Tour of the West,” playing the West Coast, Nevada, and Calgary, and the Southern Cal dates are this coming week. Details on www.tomrussell.com    
    Oct 20, he plays Riverside; Oct 21 he plays this show in in San Diego; Oct 22 he's in Los Angeles (actually Santa Monica, at McCabe's) for two shows, 8 & 10 pm; Oct 23 in Ojai; then he heads north.
    We also got word that Tom's newest art book, “Blue Horse / Red Desert,” is now available, and the original paintings from it are available at www.rainbowman.com    
    Tom Russell is one of new folk / neo folk's best songwriters, with one foot planted firmly in the lore, traditions and rugged life of the West, and the other one anyplace on the planet he
     
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Fri, Oct 21:
8 pm WILL RYAN & THE CACTUS COUNTY COWBOYS play their CD Release show tonight for the “INTERNATIONAL FORK DAY” CONCERT at the Coffee Gallery Backstage, 2029 N Lake Av, Altadena 92675; more info, www.coffeegallery.com ;  reservations number, 626-798-6236.    
    In the Guide's October 7 edition of News Features, we let you know about WILL RYAN & THE CACTUS COUNTY COWBOYS, their GRAMMY and EMMY Award-winning leader, and their triumph in the Oscars Theater (Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences) playing their new original score for the 1925 classic silent film (the first epic western), “The Covered Wagon.”
    We told you about their fine musicianship, top awards, a few of their many top awards and credits, and their upcoming debut on the West Side, at Boulevard Music on Saturday, October 22. We ventured our suspicion that they just might have a few copies of their just-finished CD for sale at that show.    
    What we did not yet know to report is that the CD RELEASE SHOW is the night before (on Friday October 21), at the Coffee Gallery Backstage in Altadena. The show at Boulevard will be the West Side CD release show.    
    But there's more than a mere release of a very fine album. Enough to warrant a News Feature, two weeks in a row. If you read, in the October 14 edition of the Guide's News Features, about the return of The Fork in the Road – an 18-foot-tall sculpture of shining cutlery, literally a fork in the road where the routes divide in Pasadena – then you may be on to this already.    
    Musician / Actor / official Singing Cowboy of Burbank WILL RYAN has (somehow) procured a proclamation from the League of Nations (via time machine, no doubt) declaring it to be “International Fork Day.” Will and his band, THE CACTUS COUNTY COWBOYS, play their CD release show that night at the Coffee Gallery Backstage, and if you bring and “show your fork” that night, you get a $3-per-ticket discount. (And you thought the spoon was the most valuable piece of silverware.) May the Fork be with you.    
    WILL RYAN & THE CACTUS COUNTY COWBOYS play their CD release shows on Friday, October 21 at 8 pm at the Coffee Gallery Backstage in Altadena, and on on the West Side on Saturday, October 22, at 8 pm at Boulevard Music in Culver City (see that listing). Either place, expect a highly entertaining show and songs you'll be humming the next day.
     
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Fri, Oct 21:
8 pm “THE NEW SOUND OF SILENT FILM: CLASSIC SILENT FILM 'NOSFERATU' WITH LIVE SCORE BY BASSIST TOM PETERS,” at the Boston Court Performing Arts Center, 70 N Mentor Av, Pasadena 91106; tix and info, including discount and bonus packages, are available at www.bostoncourt.com or 626-683-6883. Peters provides a newly conceived, live musical score for the classic silent film “Nosferatu.” Director F.W. Murnau’s “Nosferatu” (1922) stands as one of the most important films to come out of pre-World War II Germany. After almost 90 years, it still delivers chills.
     
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Fri, Oct 21:
8 pm CATIE CURTIS and MELISSA FERRICK at McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497.
     
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Saturday, October 22
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Sat & Sun, Oct 22 & 23:
Annual “WESTERN HERITAGE” weekend, part of the month-long “UNDERWOOD FAMILY FARMS HARVEST FESTIVAL” runs weekends, Oct 1-31 in Ventura County, at Underwood Family Farms, 3370 Sunset Valley Rd, Moorpark. More later, or check www.underwoodfamilyfarms.com, or call them at 805-529-3690.
     
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Sat, Oct 22:
8 pm WILL RYAN & THE CACTUS COUNTY COWBOYS play their West Side CD Release show at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583.
    Whoa up there, pardner. If you're thinking “sounds like another cowboy crooner outfit,” you're taking the wrong fork. This band dazzled a sophisticated industry audience at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences (Oscars) Theatre, performing live their original soundtrack for the first classic western movie, 1925's “Covered Wagon.” (It was that year's Best Picture, pre-Oscar by two years, chosen by the film-addicted readers of Photoplay as all definitive Best Pictures / Best Actors were at that time.) The film was reassembled from archives around the world; its old soundtrack was lost long ago, and the band's new one included lots of memorable string instrument leads plus plenty of piano themes and signature motifs, and oh yes, horns.
    It's representative of their concerts, a smooth interdisciplinary blend, a sound that's unified with just the right amount of spotlight solos for each player, rather than the product of a superbly talented ensemble – which it is – with '30s-style originals you'll be humming and choruses you'll be singing for days. WILL RYAN'S lyrical songwriting is catchy and delightful, with depth that connects great melodies to our own contemporary sensibilities. Instrumentally, they're adept, more Bob Wills-ish, more bebop jazz and '40s pop than anything from recent country-western. You get virtuoso performances by session and tour string wizard JOHN “PRESTO” REYNOLDS on banjo, guitar, and resophonic; “WESTY” WESTENHOFER on upright bass and tuba; wunderkind CHLOE FEORNAZANO, their young sax / clarinet / mandolin player; lovely big band jazz vet KATIE CAVERA on fiddle and Betty Boopish commentary, and Will's songwriting, guitar and smooth lead vocals. Tix, $15 (on sale now).
     
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Sat, Oct 22:
CALIFORNIA E.A.R. UNIT presents “Sonic Revolution,” at the Boston Court Performing Arts Center, 70 N Mentor Av, Pasadena 91106; tix and info, including discount and bonus packages, are available at www.bostoncourt.com or 626-683-6883. Don't panic. They are a chamber ensemble that performs music where the ink is still wet. The core of highly acclaimed players include Vicky Ray, Eric Clark and Amy Knoles who strive to reflect Southern California’s unique cultural diversity by acting as L.A.'s new music ambassadors to the world. The evening features works penned especially for the group by Macedonian composer Darija Andovska, Portuguese composer Miguel Azguime, Berlin's Michael Maierhof, New York's Lisa Coons, Rhode Island's Todd Winkler, as well as an offering from Alan Schockley, who is currently residing in Los Angeles.
     
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Sat, Oct 22:
8 & 10 pm TOM RUSSELL at McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497.
    Received at press time, we scrambled to add this. Tom Russell is making his “Mesabi Tour of the West,” playing the West Coast, Nevada, and Calgary, and the Southern Cal dates are this coming week. Details on www.tomrussell.com    
    Oct 20, he plays Riverside; Oct 21 he's in San Diego (see listing); Oct 22 he's in Los Angeles (actually Santa Monica, at McCabe's) for two shows, 8 & 10 pm; Oct 23 in Ojai; then he heads north.
    We also got word that Tom's newest art book, “Blue Horse / Red Desert,” is now available, and the original paintings from it are available at www.rainbowman.com    
    Tom Russell is one of new folk / neo folk's best songwriters, with one foot planted firmly in the lore, traditions and rugged life of the West, and the other one anyplace on the planet he wants to envision kicking-up the dust and sharing its grit and sparkle through his music.
    Tix for the McCabe's shows are $26.50.
     
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Sat, Oct 22:
9 pm “AMERICANA HOUSE PARTY” with MICHAEL ANN, CHRISTOPHER LOCKETT , and THE SKIP HELLER TRIO, at Rafa’s Lounge Gallery, 1836 W Sunset Bl (at the bridge where Sunset crosses Glendale Bl) Echo Park 90026; www.rafaslounge.com;  213-413-4464.  
    Multi-instrumentalist singer-songwriter Christopher Lockett is playing a show with Ozark powerhouse singer-songwriter Michael Ann and the ridiculously talented Skip Heller Trio at Rafa’s Lounge, the best-kept secret in Echo Park. C’mon down to the Americana House Party!
    Michael Ann and Heller have played The Cinema Bar, The Ranch Party and Ronnie Mack’s Barn Dance... and pretty much anyplace with a zip code. Lockett is out playing local dates in advance of his second album, due out in early 2012.
    More at the artists' websites:
http://christopherlockett.com/music    
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Skip-Heller- Trio/168857583142705    
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Michael-Ann-and-The-Missouri- Rebels/107002192654028   
    Cover, $5.
    
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Sunday, October 23
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Sun, Oct 23:
3 pm CLARENCE TREAT, an Original NEW CHRISTY MINSTREL, plus BUFFALO BILL BOYCOTT & THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN EXPRESS, play a benefit for the the Cathedral Choir, at First United Methodist Church of Glendale, Carlson Fellowship Center, 130 N Kenwood St, Glendale 91206; reservations 818-243-2105 or 818-547-1419.    
    Clarence and Bill performed together in the New Christy Minstrels and recently played their new show to packed houses in Wyoming. It was so much fun Clarence knew he had to share it with his Oxy and church choir friends, hence there's one date at each place, and both are benefit shows.
    “The whole family will love the banjo and fiddle playing, ballads, humorous cowboy poetry, yodeling (not to be missed!), poignant Native American Story Telling and original songs.” - Kemmerer [WY] Gazette, February 3, 2011. Additional quotes:
    “Joanne Orr, Buffalo Bill Boycott and Clarence Treat put on a great show….”
    “A feverish excitement erupted over Hank Williams’ ‘Jambalaya’, moving people to sing along, clapping loudly and tapping their feet.”
    “…entertaining fans with jokes, history lessons, story telling and their own life experiences. The crowd hung on to their every word.”
    "Treat made everyone’s eyes water with heartfelt tracks like 'Lights of Cheyenne' and 'Scarlet Ribbons,' from his album 'Songs I Love to Sing.'”
    They tour a lot, but don't often get to Southern California. Tix: families $50; adults $20; all students $10,
     
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Sun, Oct 23:
5 pm “JAZZ VESPERS” season opener with YELLOWJACKETS founding member, pianist RUSSELL FERRANTE, at All Saints Church, 132 N Euclid Av, Pasadena (Across from City Hall; two blocks N of Colorado Bl); Info, 626-583-2725 (M-F).
    Ferrante is accompanied by MIKE VALERIO on bass and STEVE SCHAEFFER on drums. Christina Honchell offers a meditation.
    All Saints Parishioner Russell Ferrante’s first exposure to music came from his church, where his father was the choir director as well as being a frequent vocal soloist and having a vocal gospel quartet. He began piano lessons at 9 with the expectation that one day he would be the church pianist...but his musical interests took him elsewhere.
    Ferrante says “I’ve been privileged to write with and produced records for: Bobby McFerrin, Michael Franks, Sadao Watanabe, Marilyn Scott, Eric Marianthal, and Sergio Salvatore among others. I’ve also arranged for Take 6, The GRP Big Band, Lee Ritenour, and many others.”
    In addition to working with these fine musicians, Russ is also active in local musical projects of a much smaller scale. One such project was a local production of Really Rosie by children in his community, for which he was the musical director. Russell is also a founding member of the Yellowjackets. More info at www.russellferrante.com    
    Parking available in lot N of the Church and on the street. Held on the Chancel; elevator available for accessibility, but arrive five minutes early. Free, no reservations required. A goodwill offering is accepted. Child care provided.
     
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Sun, Oct 23:
7 pm PATTY LARKIN at McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497. $20.
    
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Monday, October 24
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Mon, Oct 24:
8 pm “GREAT GUITARS: STEVE LUKATHER” at the Grammy Museum’s Clive Davis Sound Stage, 800 W Olympic Bl (entrance on Figueroa), L.A. 90015; www.grammymuseum.org;  213-765-6803.  
    He's a five-time GRAMMY-Award winner. Best known as the guitarist for TOTO, Lukather remains one of the world’s top session men, having played on over 1,500 records by a wide variety of artists over the years. Lukather started as a teenager in the studios after meeting the PORCARO BROTHERS in high school. After graduation, he joined BOZ SCAGGS’ touring band, which eventually formed officially as TOTO and was singed to Sony Records in 1977.
    While scoring such international hits such as “Rosanna” and “Africa” with the band, he managed to maintain his busy session schedule, playing on albums by PAUL McCARTNEY, MILES DAVIS, HERBIE HANCOCK, QUINCY JONES, CHEAP TRICK, ALICE COOPER, ARETHA FRANKLIN and more.
    Hear Lukather in discussion about his impressive career, with GRAMMY Foundation and MusiCares Vice President Scott Goldman. After the interview, Lukather will showcase his signature guitar work on stage. Doors open at 7:30 pm. Tickets went on sale Friday, October 7. All proceeds benefit the GRAMMY Museum.
    
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Tuesday, October 25
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Tue, Oct 25:
8 pm “GREAT GUITARS: STEVE CROPPER” at the Grammy Museum’s Clive Davis Sound Stage, 800 W Olympic Bl (entrance on Figueroa), L.A. 90015; www.grammymuseum.org;  213-765-6803.  
    Rock and Roll Hall of Fame soul guitarist Steve Cropper is a GRAMMY-Nominee. His guitar work with BOOKER T. AND THE MG’S was groundbreaking. Cropper likes to say that he’s had “four or five careers,” all of which helped shape and redefine the meaning of the term R&B.
    The latest incarnation, released in August on 429 Records and titled “Dedicated,” features Cropper and a powerful “house band” of brilliant old friends and session greats jamming through selections (some famous, some obscure 'til now) from The “5” Royales catalog with superstar artists from multiple genres and generations: B.B. KING, BUDDY MILLER, BRIAN MAY, STEVE WINWOOD, JOHN POPPER, BETTYE LAVETTE, LUCINDA WILLIAMS, SHARON JONES, SHEMEKIA COPELAND, DELBERT McCLINTON, and WILLIE JONES. Hear Cropper on stage, along with GRAMMY Foundation and MusiCares Vice President Scott Goldman, talking about his legendary career with The Mar-Keys and Stax Records, what it’s like to be one of the most sought-after session guitarists of all time, his work with OTIS REDDING and how, after 50 years in the business, he manages to “keep it fun.”
    After the discussion, Cropper will take audience questions and participate in a signing. Doors open at 7:30 pm. Public sale of tix ($15 ) begins Tuesday, October 18, at noon. (American Express ticket purchases can be made now, and include a special gift.) All proceeds benefit the GRAMMY Museum.
    
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Wednesday, October 26
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Wed, Oct 26:
7:30 pm CELTIC THUNDER at the Greek Theatre, 2700 N Vermont, Griffith Park, L.A. 90027; 213-480-3232.
     
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Friday, October 28
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Fri, Oct 28, in San Diego:
7:30 pm “MASTERS OF THE CELTIC HARP: WILLIAM JACKSON & GRÁINNE HAMBLY” play the AMSD Concert Series, 4650 Mansfield St, San Diego 92116; 619-303-8176.
     
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Fri, Oct 28:
SOLD OUT 8 pm JENNIFER WARNES at McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497.
     
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Fri, Oct 28:
8 pm SUSIE GLAZE & THE HILONESOME BAND plus FUR DIXON & STEVE WERNER at the Coffee Gallery Backstage, 2029 N Lake Av, Altadena 92675; reservations, 626-798-6236.
     
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Fri, Oct 28:
8 pm NATHAN McEUEN & MATT CARTSONIS at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. More details in the near future. This'll be a fine show. Tix on sale Oct 14; $15.
     
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Saturday, October 29
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Sat, Oct 29:
8 pm DAN NAVARRO & LAWRENCE LEBO at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. More details in the near future. This'll be a fine show, with LOWEN & NAVARRO vet Dan Navarro and Bluesy-Americana-Classic Jazzwoman Lawrence “Don't Call Her Larry” Lebo. Tix on sale Oct 15; $15.
     
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Sat, Oct 29:
“THE WHITE HOUSE CONCERT WITH STEVE ERDODY & FRIENDS,” at the Boston Court Performing Arts Center, 70 N Mentor Av, Pasadena 91106; tix and info, including discount and bonus packages, are available at www.bostoncourt.com or 626-683-6883. This is an interesting concept that relives a musical moment that was, by all accounts, magical. On November 24, 1961, President Kennedy revolutionized arts performances at the White House by presenting the famous but reclusive 84-year-old cellist PABLO CASALS in a recital for 150 of the world’s most famous and influential classical composers, conductors and musicians. To commemorate the anniversary of the historic occasion, Music at the Court is presenting local cello virtuoso STEPHEN ERDODY with an all star ensemble of chamber musicians in a recital replicating the original program from 50 years ago.
     
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Sat, Oct 29:
8 pm WILLIAM JACKSON and GRÁINNE HAMBLY bring their "TWO SIDES OF CELTIC" show just in time for Samhain (the original Celtic Halloween) at the Caltech Folk Music Society series in Beckman Institute Auditorium, on the campus in Pasadena 91106; 626-395-4652. Park in one of the two lots on Michigan Av, S off Del Mar.
    WILLIAM JACKSON , a founding member of the Scottish group OSSIAN, has performed “a couple of outstanding shows” at the series before. This time, he is joined by GRÁINNE HAMBLY, who is from Ireland. The promo from Nick Smith and Rex Meyreis, co-producers of Caltech Folk, is so good that we're simply reprinting it for you, below.
    Their recent recording together, “Music from Ireland and Scotland, is a stunningly beautiful collection of mostly traditional tunes featuring the two of them on harp, along with tin whistle, concertina, and bouzouki. Along with the late, great singer, Tony Cuffe, William was a founding member of the much missed traditional Scottish group, Ossian, who we were lucky enough to have at Caltech back in 1988. Since then, his solo harp career has taken off, and he has become world renowned with touring and with recordings, such as “The Wellpark Suite.” He is equally adept in his interpretations of traditional tunes as he is as a composer. His Land of Light won the international competition in 1999 as the new song for Scotland, announced on the eve of that Parliament convening for the first time in 300 years.
    As impressive as William's two solo appearances at Caltech have been, we are delighted that he will be joined for this show by Gráinne (pronounced "GRAWN-yuh") Hambly, from County Mayo, Ireland. Gráinne has 3 solo recordings and two song book collections to her credit. Finton Vallely wrote that her CD, Between the Showers, is "an altogether beautiful harp album that takes on the full gamut of traditional dance music and airs as well as three Carolan pieces that include the unusual Madge Malone and two versions of Turlough MacDonough." The interplay of these two master musicians promises a truly memorable evening of music.
    Listen to them on Youtube at www.youtube.com/watch?v=LR8mXsQY-KY.     
    The web page for their CD is www.harpagency.com/artist1.htm    
    Their individual web sites are www.wjharp.com and www.grainne.harp.net.     
    Tickets for this show are $15 for adults and $5 for Caltech students and children, and they can be ordered by calling the Ticket Office at 626-395-4652, visiting the Ticket Office, or purchased for cash at the door (if it doesn't sell-out). The Ticket Office is open noon to 5 pm Monday through Friday.
     
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Sat, Oct 29:
SOLD OUT 8 pm JENNIFER WARNES at McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497.
     
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Sat, Oct 29:
8 pm CLIFF WAGNER & THE OLD #7 bring bluegrass to the Folk Music Center & Museum, 220 Yale Av, Claremont 91711; 909-624-2928; www.folkmusiccenter.com.  Tix, $10.   
     
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Sunday, October 30
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Sun, Oct 30:
3 & 7 pm “SAMHAIN” Irish Song, Dance & Story, with optional traditional Samhain dinner, brings the story of Halloween and a celebration of the Celtic New Year, with SLUGGER O'TOOLE, BARRY LYNCH, ACS DANCERS, ADAM KIRK, CHRIS LOKEN, AEDAN MacDONNELL, STEVE PRIBYL, & LINEA SOLEDAD, sponsored by the Celtic Arts Center at the Burbank Moose Lodge, 1901 W Burbank Bl, Burbank 91506. Two shows, 3 pm or 7 pm, tix for either are $18; 5 pm dinner tix are $15; show + dinner, $30. Tix will sell-out early; info & advance tix, www.CelticArtsCenter.com/Samhain.    
     
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Sat, Oct 30:
7 pm THE BATTLEFIELD BAND at McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497. Tix, $24.50.
     
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BEYOND OCTOBER...
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Fri, Nov 4:
8 pm MARLEY'S GHOST at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. More details in the near future. Tix on sale Oct 21; $17.50.
     
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Fri, Nov 4:
8 pm WILLY PORTER at McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497. Tix, $22.50.
     
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Fri, Nov 4:
“OH COSMONAUT!” presented by the Heidi Duckler Dance Theatre at the Boston Court Performing Arts Center, 70 N Mentor Av, Pasadena 91106; tix and info, including discount and bonus packages, are available at www.bostoncourt.com or 626-683-6883.
     
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Sat, Nov 5:
8 pm DREAM STREET at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. More details in the near future. Tix on sale Oct 22; $17.50.
     
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Sat, Nov 5:
VOX FEMINA presents “AND JUSTICE FOR ALL,” at the Boston Court Performing Arts Center, 70 N Mentor Av, Pasadena 91106; tix and info, including discount and bonus packages, are available at www.bostoncourt.com or 626-683-6883. Expect an inspiring evening about love and equality, as the mighty voices of Vox Femina explore the issues of equality and immigration, and their passion for fairness, proving that all men and women are created equal. The highlight of the concert will be Mark Koval’s work “We the People,” the story of the fight for marriage equality in narration and song.
     
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Sat, Nov 5:
8 & 10 pm GRAHAM PARKER at McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497. 8 pm is sold out. Tix, $24.50.
     
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Sun, Nov 6:
10:30 am JUSTIN ROBERTS & THE NOT READY FOR NAPTIME PLAYERS play the Kids Concert at McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497. Tix, $17.
     
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Sun, Nov 6
7 pm JOHN WESLEY HARDING & The KING CHARLES TRIO plus THE MINUS FIVE at McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497. Tix, $22.50.
     
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Fri, Nov 11:
8 pm AL STEWART plays McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497. Still famous for his fine songs, “Time Passages” and “Year of the Cat,” he's here for two nights, the 11th and 12th. Tix, $24.50
     
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Fri, Nov 11:
ILIANA ROSE BAND: “HOT NIGHTS IN HAVANA!” at the Boston Court Performing Arts Center, 70 N Mentor Av, Pasadena 91106; tix and info, including discount and bonus packages, are available at www.bostoncourt.com or 626-683-6883. Romantic melodies, voluptuous poetry, and pulsing rhythms of Cuban Salsa abound. Hailed as a spirited and vibrant presence on and off stage, Iliana's voice is pure, warm, sensual and beautiful, captivating audiences in English, Spanish and Portuguese.
     
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Sat, Nov 12:
8 pm THREE MUSCKETEERS (Three mUSCketeers) at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. More details in the near future. Tix on sale Oct 29; $15.
     
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Sat, Nov 12:
RICHARD PEARSON THOMAS: “SONGS FROM NEW YORK,” at the Boston Court Performing Arts Center, 70 N Mentor Av, Pasadena 91106; tix and info, including discount and bonus packages, are available at www.bostoncourt.com or 626-683-6883. With “the heart and soul of the quintessential New York musician,” Thomas has received praise from the likes of Audra McDonald, Sanford Sylvan, Lauren Flanagan and Kurt Ollmann. Richard will perform an eclectic selection of his music with his brilliant TRILLIUM ENSEMBLE collaborators, California based soprano PATRICIA PRUNTY and New York based baritone BRUCE RAMEKER.
     
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Sat, Nov 12:
8 pm AL STEWART plays McCabe’s, 3101 Pico Bl, Santa Monica 90405; 310-828-4497. Still famous for his fine songs, “Time Passages” and “Year of the Cat,” he's here for two nights, the 11th and 12th. Tix, $24.50
     
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Fri, Nov 18:
8 pm “A FAMOUS BRITISH TRIBUTE BAND” at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. More details in the near future. Even the venue won't tell you who yet, citing their “Don't strum, don't tell” policy.” Big reveal is Oct 22. Tix on sale Nov 4; $17.50.
     
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Sat, Nov 19:
“ORPHEUS AND EURIDICE” at the Boston Court Performing Arts Center, 70 N Mentor Av, Pasadena 91106; tix and info, including discount and bonus packages, are available at www.bostoncourt.com or 626-683-6883. This artful production explores what happens when Orpheus gives up his mythic lyre for a clarinet. Find out in an innovative staging of award-winning American composer RICKY IAN GORDON’s reimagining of the classic love story. Graceful and dramatic is the beloved Euridice as created by up-and-coming soprano superstar ALEXANDRA LOUTSION. World renowned pianist ALAN SMITH provides the vibrant keyboard landscape that supports the longing voice of masterful clarinetist JAMES SULLIVAN’s poignant Orpheus.
    
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Sun, Nov 20:
8 pm monthly “VARIETY NIGHT” with featured artists CALI ROSE & CRAIG BRANDAU and the sign-up-in-advance OPEN MIC, at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. Open Mic signups limited to the first eight, and are taken beginning Nov 6 at 1 pm at the venue. Tix, $4.
    
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Fri, Dec 2:
8 pm ROB ICKES & JIM HURST at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. More details in the near future. Tix on sale Nov 18; $17.50.
    
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Sat, Dec 3:
8 pm LOAFER'S GLORY at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. More details in the near future. Tix on sale Nov 19; $20.
    
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Sat, Dec 10:
8 pm JANET KLEIN & HER PARLOR BOYS at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. More details in the near future. Tix on sale Nov 26; $17.50.
    
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Sat, Dec 17:
8 pm THE WITCHER BROTHERS bring dynamite bluegrass to Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. More details in the near future. Tix on sale Dec 4; $15.
    
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Sun, Dec 18:
7 pm Annual “FREE HOLIDAY SHOW” at Boulevard Music, 4316 Sepulveda Bl, Culver City 90230; 310-398-2583. An established tradition here, with entertainment provided by the teachers (recording stars / session players all) at the venue / music store. Cookies and baked confections are always anticipated at this event, too. More details in the near future. Free.
    
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MUCH MORE COMING SOON!
     
     
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ARTISTS JOIN “OCCUPY WALL STREET” AS UNEMPLOYMENT, ECONOMY WORSEN

    
    This feature originally appeared in the News Features section of the October 7, 2011 edition of the Acoustic Americana Music Guide.
    
    We are reprinting it here in its entirety to enable the many comments we have received to appear with it (as soon as we get them moderated and moved here). We welcome your comment, after you have read the piece and as many comments as you wish to read from others.
    
    
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Our # 5 Story (in the October 7 edition)
    
ARTISTS JOIN “OCCUPY WALL STREET” AS UNEMPLOYMENT, ECONOMY WORSEN
    
    “There's something happening here, what it is ain't exactly clear.” - '60s song lyrics.
    
    New Census statistics are out. Brace yourself. 48.5% of all American households now get some kind of government aid. 34% live in a household that gets Food Stamps or some kind of welfare benefit. 14% are on Medicare.
    
    There's more. 46% of households will pay no federal taxes this year, and 45% paid none last year.
    
    Unemployment is officially 14 million, plus six or seven million more who are underemployed and wanting full-time work, plus more we'll get into in a moment. That translates to an official unemployment rate of 9.1%, and up to 12%, depending where you are. But that's not the entire picture. The criteria for reporting unemployment rates only reflects the people who are currently collecting unemployment benefits. That's been the case since the Nixon Administration. BUT – Once your unemployment insurance benefits are exhausted, you are deemed a “discouraged worker” (yep, that's the term they use) and you drop off the map. The system loses the ability to count you for statistical purposes, except in spot updates for the Census.
    
    If you're in that predicament, you're probably descending into deep debt, you certainly don't have a job, but you're not unemployed. It's insane. The actual numbers of people out of work and seeking jobs is really about 31%, or one in five Americans of working-age, plus the 5% (or so) who are underemployed because that's all they can find.
    
    All of the above numbers are worse than they were during the depths of the Great Depression that began in 1929. Mega-billionaire Warren Buffet even called on Congress to raise his tax rates, emphasizing how ludicrously wrong things are, that his secretary paid more taxes last year than he did. He was ridiculed by other fat cats and by corporate-lackey politicians.
    
    We hear more of that '60s song: “Paranoia runs deep...”
    
    Instead of anything pro-active, politicians in Congress are blocking an embarrassingly modest Jobs Bill proposed by the Obama Administration. It's all about contrarian politics and what one financial reporter calls “paralysis and toxicity” in the face of a crisis.
    
    We should be talking about the exact form and structure of a new WPA and a new CCC to re-employ Americans with projects that will give us all a future legacy – like that we inherited from the enduring public works projects of the '30s. We could be building high-speed rail and alternatives to gas-guzzling automobiles and alternatives to polluting coal-fired power plants. We could be leading the world in high tech investment and encouraging math and science education with a vigorous space program, aimed at Mars, instead of pouring money and blood into the sands of Afghanistan. We could be creating jobs so that the 24% of the military enlistees, who go there because there are no other jobs, could find career work in improving our society and rebuilding it for their children's future.
    
    Instead, we are told that a tepid jobs bill is dead on arrival in the House of Representatives, even as we see record profits for companies that took our money to employ people overseas, but not here. We see money being used to make money without creating any jobs or benefits for our society in a time when meaningful, career-track jobs should be our key national priority. We're not building for the future. We're not even doing required maintenance on the gifts we received from our parents and grandparents. We hear politicians rant that government must charge the rich no taxes and make Capital Gains profits off-limits to taxation, altogether. We see bonuses paid to money manipulators who exported America's jobs even as they took bailouts from taxpayers. Rome is burning. They're buying Stradovari violins with our money.
    
    Wall Street, led by Big Oil, continues to post record profits. The rest of us are, at best, being squeezed, at worst, seeing our futures get raped, pillaged and plundered.
    
    That's true from the macro to the micro end of the average American's shrinking economic spectrum. At “Occupy L.A.,” an oversized mock check is held aloft; in the amount of $673 billion, it represents the payment that protestors say is due from Bank of America to the People of California “for destruction” caused by the megabank's mortgage foreclosure and other practices.
    
    Big banks, who enjoyed billions in taxpayer-funded bailouts, continue to find ways to screw their customers. Small things are representative of their philosophy and larger practices.
    
    There's Chase Bank, luring new accounts with promises of “no fees, no minimum balances and $100 of the bank's money for you,” and then changing the rules to charge $20 per account per month in fees – after you're trapped there for a year because you accepted their hundred bucks. (Do the math: the fees on one account are $240 a year.)
    
    There's Bank of America, luring you with a no-fee, no-minimum-balance account, then slapping you with $8.95 a month for your account statement, plus $5 a month from then on, if you use your debit card (even once) to buy anything in a store or online. (That totals to $167.40 a year in fees.)
    
    But getting a loan from either of them, to buy a house or start a small business that would be a job creator? Forget it. All that bailout money they took? It's too tight, especially since millions of it went to executive bonuses.
    
    It's all nuts. We amass record levels of consumer debt just trying to hang-on, because record numbers of us are unemployed or underemployed. Instead of us running up debt trying to survive, government could be (gasp) borrowing money – something it could do at record low interest rates – to finance public works projects that would employ our own people.
    
    But nothing gets done, even as our individual consumer debt increases each month to set new record levels while no one gets a job to repay it. Of course, the money manipulators post record profits because they game the system, exploit foreign workers with low pay in dangerous workplaces, and sell the world inferior junk. They pay themselves obscene bonuses as rewards for bringing their corporations record profits based on cutting and exporting jobs, after they merge, over-consolidate, eliminate competition, and erase any pressure to make better products.
    
    They play shell games with the profits of their offshore operations to escape and avoid paying taxes. They get away with it because they own the politicians they buy with campaign contributions in amounts that are now unlimited (since the 2010 Supreme Court decision in Citizens United). They protect themselves at the expense of everyone else, no matter what happens, even when they're the ones exacerbating it. And many of them flaunt it.
    
Enter “Occupy Wall Street”
    
    That '60s song is playing: “You better stop, hey, what's that sound, everybody look what's goin' down.”
    
    Is it any wonder that, twenty-one days ago, a movement began to “Occupy Wall Street” in protest of, as the occupiers put it, “the one percent” that are predators on “the 99 percent” of Americans? Indeed, we have literally reached a point where the top one percent makes one-fourth of the income in America. That, too, is a record. Meanwhile, the system has quite literally stopped working for everyone else; income has been flat for decades for all but the super-rich.
    
    This phenomenon – this Occupy Wall Street thing – is something that appears to be a genuine grassroots uprising by a broad cross-section of ordinary people of all ages. It's people who are fed-up with watching the fat cats game the system and prosper at the expense of the rest of us. It's people fed-up with being disillusioned, people disgusted by what they see happening and feel powerless to stop, people who include the long-term unemployed, who are young and middle-aged and old, people who should be at the mid-points of their careers doing jobs that were suddenly exported to China, people who see no one doing anything to improve their prospects, people who are being told to prepare for a time of decline and diminished expectations, people who, consequently, have “had it” to the point of taking to the streets.
    
    They're taking one street in particular – Wall Street, the home base and monolithic symbol of the 21st century's resurrection of the ruthless Robber Barons we thought we'd left in the 19th century, back there on the junk heap of rich elitists who controlled politicians to protect their own tyrannical exploitation of people and resources and capital and the environment.
    
    Suddenly, a growing number of people are asking, “How much is enough,” enough tax breaks, enough record profits for the rich, enough to manipulate and to control for one's own ego and greed? The malcontents are collectively declaring that they have “had enough” of watching their country and their future concentrate wealth into fewer hands at the expense of those who have worked their whole lives for modest returns that are now being denied, and they have simply had enough of being exploited. Even the ersatz populism of the Koch Brothers-funded Tea Party has begun to transcend an agenda that was, early on, spoon-fed to its followers. Somewhere, some manipulator must be holding his breath at the thought that Tea Partiers may have started thinking for themselves and looking out for their own futures.
    
    Generally apolitical members of Middle America's rapidly diminishing middle class, along with disillusioned Democrats and Ron Paul conservatives and hardcore right-wingers, have joined students who face deeper debts from higher tuition and the impossibility of getting all the classes to finish a degree in four years at a campus where cutbacks have occurred, and they've all joined recent graduates who have no job prospects and no hope of paying student loans, and there are the people facing mortgage foreclosure, and those who have lost homes, and those at or near Medicare age, and workers who have seen their benefit packages erode to almost nothing, and the vast ranks of unemployed of all skill levels and levels of education and expertise, and workers who have had their pension funds stolen by money manipulators, and union members fighting legislation that would undo the gains it took a century to achieve, and left-leaning social activists, and veterans of G4 summit protests, and yes, a few genuine radicals and even a handful of bonafide anarchists. It's a crazy quilt that's the real America.
    
    At “Occupy Washington” in the nation's capital, one of the 22 satellite sites spawned by “Occupy Wall Street,” one woman's sign reads, “Lost my job – found an occupation.”
    
    Critics and many watchers in the media opine that it isn't organized enough to be a movement, this conglomeration of refugees of the ninety-nine percent. We answer that it doesn't need to be coherently structured and organized. Native American Indians fought on horseback with each warrior his own general, willing to boldly lead and be led to facilitate taking part, but not willing to be commanded by anyone. The internet analogue shows us countless examples of large numbers buying-in to ideas and movements that have a bare minimum of officious formality. They don't require it. Should we wonder that “Occupy Wall Street” would resonate in our time, without a published manifesto or Statement of Purpose?
    
    Should we wonder, in an age of web forums that allow equal access and participation – without regard to geographic location – that this populist outrage would engage others too far away to join those in New York? Like a viral flash demonstration that won't go away, other communities' financial districts get cloned “occupations” tapping the same discontent, including one that grew during a rainstorm at the diagonally-opposite corner of the country, in L.A.
    
    Is it any wonder that artists are part of this new community that's spreading nationwide to these “occupations”-? Some bring six-strings, others add voices. They sing songs of the uniquely American consciousness, old songs of social justice and labor organizing, new songs of economic justice, songs from the last Great Depression, old and new songs of struggle and overcoming oppression and exploitation, songs of camaraderie of common purpose, songs decrying greed and manipulation and thwarted opportunity, songs of fat cats whose lack of concern rivals the aristocrats' “Let them eat cake” cliche of the French Revolution.
    
    Should we wonder at that? Is it any wonder that it is the artists, as an inevitable part of their own experience of it, who are already writing new anthems and updating lyrics for the old ones, defining the experience and giving it voice and inspiring their fellow “occupiers”-?
    
    In the first week, politicians and even the media were dismissing the Wall Street occupiers as a mob with no coherent agenda. By the second week, TV news was running a clip from the movie, “Network,” with the key line, “I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore!”
    
    The “not-a-movement” movement quickly won supporters and sympathizers over its first weekend, when 70 of its participants were arrested, following the caught-on-camera violence inflicted and indiscriminate hosings with pepper spray or mace inflicted on unresisting people by New York Police officers and one police official. THAT made it news, as numerous media outlets commented with a sense that the NYPD had just erased the residual goodwill it had earned following 9-11. That rhetoric lasted until police and fire unions joined the occupiers, and signs appeared with slogans like “No more cuts to fire, police, and emergency responders.”
    
    The New York protestors – or occupiers – won more hearts and minds by cleverly defeating the nearly unprecedented ban the city had slapped on them, prohibiting their use of bullhorns or mics with electric amplification. The group quickly unified by developing and implementing “The People's Microphone,” wherein everyone within earshot of any recognized speaker simply shouts, in synchronized repetition, whatever the speaker says. It's effective. Everyone hears, as each phrase or sentence is repeated all the way to the far end of the crowd. For ingenuity, doggedness of purpose, and building group cohesion, it's unbeatable.
    
    Give an artist the whole scenario – all of it, starting with what caused it in the first place, the fat cats prospering off everyone else who sees their prospects diminishing, and then the scenes of mishandling by New York officials and attempted suppression of those pointing-out the inequities of worsening economic oppression, then the goofy statements by rich political neophytes who don't get it, like Herman Cain, who asserts it's all orchestrated by the Obama campaign – and expect songs like Bob Dylan wrote during the Civil Rights and Vietnam era.
    
    Not that we expect the fat cats to “get it.” So we'll close with an effort to help them.
    
    MEMO TO THOSE WALLOWING IN WALL STREET BONUSES AND BANK BAILOUT BILLIONS and the taxpayer-subsidized obscene profits of Big Oil in your decadently furnished, hermetically sealed offices: You've lost the battle for hearts and minds. No one (except your fellow greedy elitists in “the one percent”) will be sympathetic to you, because the artists are on to you and they can see the emperor has all the gold, but no clothes. You've had your day in the sun on your gated private beach, with your tax-free yachts and caviar and free rides on your capital gains – your chief sources of income – and tax rates lower than what your secretaries pay. In case you hadn't noticed, the artists are not only on to you, they're telling the truth from a position to attract and inform everyone else. The occupiers will besiege you until you wake up and realize we're all in this together, sharing this fragile planet and all needing essential shares of its resources. And you, the 1%, have no Right of Kings to oppress the rest of us in the 99%.
    
    
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    THE ABOVE FEATURE originally appeared in the News Features section of the October 7, 2011 edition of the Acoustic Americana Music Guide.
    
    Your comments and responses are invited at tiedtothetracks@hotmail.com  
  
or by replying through the Blogspot edition.
  
    All replies and comments are moderated before they appear, and we currently have QUITE a backlog to get through. Still, YOUR PARTICIPATION is invited, welcomed, and valued, and we WILL get your message posted. Let us know if you want to be iden tified or if you want your email included with your post. Otherwise, our policy is to protect the identities of our readers.    
    
    
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REPLIES, RESPONSES & COMMENTS … (Most recent appears first, earliest is last)
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[Reply / Response / Comment...]

From Rachel Maddow show. ALL OCCUPIERS need this. An app called “Help I'm Getting Arrested.” You download it to your smartphone and when you get arrested, you open it and it sends a message to everyone you preprogrammed to tell when they hauled you away. I think she said 23,000 downloads so far.
    
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[Reply / Response / Comment...]

Want proof that the rich get richer and the rest of us keep getting poorer?
    
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) just released new figures today that shows American's incomes over the past 40 years.
    
It shows a very modest 1 and 1/3 %-per-year growth of Middle Class incomes, and that is for only 1/5 of the population. (The Middle Class is shrinking.) That income growth wasn't nearly enough to keep pace with inflation.
    
But the top 1% saw their wealth nearly triple. It went up 275 %.
    
The poor in America declined markedly, showing an 18 % total increase for the entire 30 year period. That's a 6/10 % per year gain, which was far less than inflation. That group grew larger while falling farther and farther into poverty.
    
The CBO report also states that the government today is doing LESS than ever before to address income disparity. In fact, a decade of reduced taxes on the rich accelerated the disparity.
    
It this isn't enough to make the entire 99% join the people occupying Wall Street, then I give up. - Chris C
    
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[Reply / Response / Comment...]

The Oakland Police are dumbasses. I can't believe what I saw last night. Iraq War veteran (two tours) Scott Olson was shot by police and is in critical condition with a skull fracture. Occupy Oakland is returning and everyone is learning the lyrics to the old Civil Rights song, 'We Shall Not Be Moved.' I'm afraid, but I'm going. If I get broken bones, I won't be the first. If I get arrested I have Martin Luther King's “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” and quotes from Gandhi in my pocket to read aloud to everyone else in jail (or the hospital). It's time to take a stand.
- Cindy
    
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[Reply / Response / Comment...]

News from Occupy Atlanta. The city's mayor had everyone at Occupy Atlanta arrested last night including Georgia State Senator Vincent Fort. Fort says this is “A war on working people.” He also says he will “Go back as often as necessary until the public understands that corporate greed has put us in this mess. I will be with the Occupy Atlanta movement as long as it takes.” Not all politicians are on the corporate dole or carrying the corporate line.
    
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[Reply / Response / Comment...]

I can't believe what I'm seeing. Oakland is a police riot.

In New York last week, cops arrested well dressed people inside banks where they went to close their accounts, after walking there from Occupy Wall Street.

New York was cops following dumb orders. In Oakland, the cops are hitting unarmed people with clubs and they seem to be enjoying it.

Both places put police on display and “the whole world is watching” like the chants and signs say.

I have a message for all the cops everywhere with their Robocop gear. You look like the Chinese tanks suppressing the people in Tiananmen Square. Protestors are committed to nonviolence but they are not trained and human endurance can take only so much unjustified abuse.

BTW, the occupy movement is trying to keep police jobs from being cut too, if you didn't know... - Rachel R.
    
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[Reply / Response / Comment...]

Watching the cops in Oakland beat up the Occupiers. I hope the next song someone writes is not an update of Neil Young's “Four Dead in Ohio.”
    
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[Reply / Response / Comment...]

today's reported stats. 43% of america agrees with the occupy movement. 69% believe republican policies favor the rich. obama may be a big disappointment, but who supports protectors of the elitists instead? (answer: elitists who control big media, like FOX news)
- richard t.
    
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[Reply / Response / Comment...]

Heard today, said by Laura Flanders, talk radio host and author of book, “At the Tea Party”: “What is the place of the public in a corporate owned state?”

The fact that such a question must be asked would scare the hell out of the Founding Fathers. - Ed
    
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[Reply / Response / Comment...]

Obama says we can't afford to wait for congress to act. We can't afford to wait for HIM to act, either. Where is the kind of IMMEDIATE action we need to put MILLIONS back to work doing things that need to be done, fixing things that are broken RIGHT NOW?! - Ranting Robin
    
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[Reply / Response / Comment...]

The cost of college has about tripled on average since I went, and it's more than six times as expensive where I went to school. My kid can't qualify for a student loan based on my income, which is really stupid, because I am now unemployed. The best I can do is tell my kid that half of this year's college grads can't find a job anyway. I can't believe I'm talking to my own kid and minimizing the worth of a college education. I feel like a crappy mom. Things were not supposed to be like this. - Shirley E
    
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[Reply / Response / Comment...]

Thanks, Wall Street. Everybody needs to have a purpose in life and yours is to be the ultimate bad example. I don't even know if the “occupiers” are a good example, but they're my good example. BTW, every time the cops harass them (in any of the occupy protests anywhere) I lose respect for the cops as too stupid to see the occupiers are the only ones calling for no cuts to teachers, firemen and COPS! - Ben O
    
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[Reply / Response / Comment...]

EJ Dionne, Washington Post writer, says the Occupy movement will likely be like the labor movement was, to the left of FDR, and like civil rights was, to the left of LBJ, but will show up to vote for progressive candidates who are only partway to where they are.
    
I'm not so sure.
    
The people (all the people) HATE congress. Many more Democrats are up for reelection in 2012 than Republicans.
    
We know the Republicans take marching orders from Mitch McConnell and John Boehner and there is no way they will give anything the occupy movement wants or that ordinary people need.
    
But that doesn't mean the occupy movement is in the bag for the Dems. Unless the Democrats DO something that the occupy movement wants to see happen, most occupiers will sit this one out and work for change in other ways.
    
After all, the unions got started and became powerful with NO politicians doing anything to help them, then they went after the politicians who messed with them. - Liliana
    
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The Occupy movement needs to change its name to “THE 99% MOVEMENT.” That's what they are and that would attract the most people to see what they are about. Then I could stop saying “they” and start saying “we.” - Sean
    
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I just got back from Afghanistan and was looking for some music. I was surprised to find your feature on Occupy Wall Street. Thank you for writing it. It did a better job for me, understanding what it's about, than anything I read online before I got home or than anything in today's paper. - Bill
    
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We don't need the $9.99 pizza guy, we need both Roosevelts: Teddy the Trust-Buster (curiously enough, a Republican) who dethroned the Robber Barons and broke-up the big monopoly corporations, and FDR (the prototype Progressive Democrat) who put hopeless hordes of unemployed back to work quickly, to do worthwhile needed things.

FDR's New Deal had no computers to help do anything, but it organized work forces and did more than has ever been accomplished before or since. Just one thing, they went into the National Parks and built beautiful lodges and architectural jewels that are still there, but are falling apart for lack of maintenance. Duhh! FIX THEM!

Don't we need urgent replacement and upgrades of highways and bridges?

Aren't there levees that need rebuilding before rivers flood in the Great Plains next spring?

After the devastating fires in the San Gabriel Mountains, don't we need new trees planted to prevent soil erosion and new trails built to get in and take care of them so they live and grow?

Obama says things “aren't as shovel ready as we thought.”

WHERE is he looking? Just buy us shovels and pay us when we use them to do something in our communities, Mr. President! Give ME a shovel, a map, seedlings and a paycheck. I'll get started RIGHT NOW! I only need time to pack a sack lunch.

There's debris in storm drains to be shoveled out. Get us shovels and paychecks and trucks to haul it away! There are coastal wetlands that need berms to protect them. Multiply that by everything like it that's obvious and needs to be done RIGHT NOW, and we can all work in the short run while you figure out how to restart FDR's big solutions.

The Republicans say the answer to everything is to cut spending and lay-off teachers and let only big corporations run the economy? What McMansion with illegal alien gardeners and maids do they live in? How effing stupid do they think we are? Duhh! - TJ
    
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Those [expletive] [expletives] on Wall Street may be getting revealed in a new movie called MARGIN CALL. I don't know for sure because I haven't got enough money this month to go see it. I probably won't have enough next month either. But it does my poor unemployed, broke, but not quite broken, heart good to know that Hollywood is making a margin call that calls them out. I know you censor cussing but it makes me feel good to say EXACTLY what I think of them. [Expletive] thieves! - Carlos
    
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The only thing wrong with Occupy Wall Street and “Occupy Anyplace Else” is an image problem. It comes across like a homeless encampment. I need to go down there and meet them and find out who they are because I agree with what I've heard them say. Thanks for describing things so well that I realized it. - Luke
    
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I'm young enough that I haven't been worrying about things like no health care. Then I needed a dentist and had to hock my guitar. Since I didn't have it to play, I started reading. I found your article and that opened my eyes to read more. I've read about a lot I didn't know was happening. It's worse than I thought out there. Now I wonder why we elect people to represent us and they don't do anything except take Wall Street money to run for reelection?
    
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If you are rich and manipulate the deductions game, then this is class warfare. If you're anybody else, this is self preservation.
    
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You called Obama's Jobs Bill tepid. I had to look that up. It means halfhearted, lukewarm, unenthusiastic. I think that the President IS enthusiastic about his Jobs Bill, even after it was defeated as a package (it's coming back as a series of newly introduced pieces). That (Obama's enthusiasm for it) is part of the tragedy. We need a whole lot more to get the rest of us enthusiastic. Congress is giving us nothing. The people have no choice but Direct Action.
    
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We ARE the 99% and the sooner we get together and make the politicians fear us at the ballot box, the sooner they will do something for us, instead of finding more ways to bail out the rich corporate, tax dodging 1%. - Justin
    
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I am so glad to know that artists are supporting the 'Occupy' occupations. My mother marched with Dr. King and she told me many times how everyone drew strength and courage from singing together and learning songs by listening to others sing them. - Bet
    
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Occupy Wall Street and its sister occupations have done a remarkable job keeping things non-violent. But they are not anything like a unified group, as you said.

They are a coalition of the dispossessed and the disillusioned. This country is swimming in guns.

Some of the Teabaggers wore holstered sidearms at their rallies two years ago. You point out that some Teabaggers have joined the occupy groups. Cops are at all the demonstrations and have gotten violent against the demonstrators.

If right wing politicians keep flinging dismissive insults at the occupiers and cops keep pushing people around, we could have a bloodbath. People have lost too much and some have hair-triggers on themselves and their emotions. Put all that together and this is very scarey indeed.
    
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Most artists I know are scrupulously non-political in public. But talk to them about any issue as it relates to people and they're there. I hope a lot of artists read your article and share it on their websites and facebook links.
    
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The whole OCCUPY thing is not new. It happened in the last Depression and came to a tragic end. Everyone should take a look at this and think about what happened. (It'll be in a big story in New York Magazine in a few days):

Military veterans of World War I OCCUPIED Washington, D.C. where they built an encampment. They couldn't find work any better than anyone else. They had been promised “the bonus,” a payment from the government for their military service that would help them in their old age. But the vets called on Congress because they needed it right away, in the depths of the Depression, to save their homes and farms and just to buy food. Congress rejected them. That brought huge numbers of “Bonus Marchers” who marched on the nation's capital. (They were also called the “Bonus Army.”)

What happened to those occupiers, the Bonus Marchers, was shameful. President Hoover sent the US Army in, under General Douglas MacArthur, to run them out. It was the last action by the US Army's Horse Cavalry and it was as awful as the cavalry at Wounded Knee, plus they used tanks. Veterans and their families, including children, were trampled under charging horses. People died when MacArthur put the torch to the encampment. Unarmed Americans, our military veterans and their families, were shot by the Army.

When newsreels were shown in theaters the following week, the people cheered the Bonus Marchers and booed the US Army and MacArthur. Brutal treatment of peaceful demonstrators always backfires in this country, as it would later with Civil Rights marchers. When FDR was elected President, he quietly got the Bonus Bill through Congress.

This time around, in 2011, there is again a record number of unemployed veterans. Except this time, changing Presidents is not going to make anything better and it could make things a whole lot worse. We need to get the Prez we've got to do much more, and we need to impeach anyone in Congress who blocks everything and offers no better ways.

One other thing I learned. The unemployed who became homeless throughout the Depression built encampments across America, just like the Occupiers now. Wherever they were, they were all called the same thing -- “Hoovervilles” for the Republican President they all saw as caring only about the rich. We should call the occupations “99%villes.” - Irv
    
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Is everybody who reads Larry's so-called music guide a socialist? I want to keep what I work for and not be forced to give it away to some crybaby who bought more house than they could afford.

I remember a 60 Minutes story on the “Millenials,” a whole generation of crybabies who were raised from 1980 to 2000 and who need to be coddled and spoken softly too and given free lunches at work. They expect too much time off and you can't dare criticize them for being late for work. You people needed to be spanked when you were children throwing tantrums. But you received medals from your soccer moms because everybody got a medal for being “special” whether they could score a goal or not. I'm sick of you people. Where are the country songs about you? Those are the only songs that tell the truth and they should sing one about all of YOU.

Part of the reason jobs get shipped overseas is because people there are willing to WORK. If you're unemployed ask yourself how bad you want to work, really work, like picking lettuce? We won't have an illegal immigrant issue if unemployed Americans get off their ass and pick the fruit and vegetables.

Some jobs go begging because our people are too spoiled to do them. It would be a good lesson in character for a lot of grownup spoiled brats who think the world owes them a living.
    
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You've written before about how we need to determine priorities. I know you want to see a big space program instead of a big military. I know you've advocated for high speed rail and expanding Amtrak.

I'm finally and begrudgingly ready to accept that some “big” things are necessary because there are so many people in this country and in the world. But only some big things.

I wish we didn't have to have “big” anything, because I believe the quality of life is better without it and I've always thought big was bad, too controlling, too corrupting.

The whole Wall Street thing makes me wonder how long it takes “big” anything to get merged and manipulated by the rich into Too Big To Fail?

Some bog projects that put lots of people to work? OK, but I'd be more comfortable if the big projects built a lot of little things that won't require a big company to manage them.
    
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A musician friend in California sent me your editorial on Occupy Wall Street. I read it and thought, 'pretty good, but I've seen most of this already.' When I told her that, she wrote back and noted when it was first published in your Musicguide. I Googled other articles from that same day and then I got impressed. You were out front of everybody with this. If I can get your editorials every week without all the listings of concerts, sign me up. (I'm in Boston and the concert stuff isn't something I could use).

[Done. You're signed-up to received the Guide's weekly News Features. Thanks. - Editor]
    
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I've hated politics since third grade when a group of kids made everybody else feel bad because we we were not in their group. My teacher told me they were “playing politics” and that was all it took to make me hate it. My parents always tried to make me feel bad and shame me into voting by saying I was “neglecting my civic responsibility.” That just made me hate it more. I didn't vote until I felt I had something to vote FOR and it lost. I was in my 30's. I only vote sometimes now.

But something just changed. I see it clearly for the first time. Those kids in third grade were not “playing politics.” They were bullies.

Wall Street is a bunch of bullies. Now I know what I've always really hated is bullies.

I've got some years of political participation to catch up on and I want the bullies to get what's coming to them. That's the best thing I can do for “civic responsibility.” I'll look into the occupation.
    
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I'm working three jobs now, all part time, and making less than I used to make with one job and I have no benefits now. I went to trade school and it was expensive but it meant I was always supposed to have a skill that would keep me employed. Now I never have a day off. Never. I'm exhausted. Sometimes I don't know how I stay awake long enough to get home. I have a girlfriend I get to see like maybe twice a week. She asked me if I would still be doing this in a year and I can't answer her. If I was old I couldn't do it all. I don't think I would live long enough to get old if I had to keep living like this. Where's my bailout?
    
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Wall Street got away with it because nobody was looking out for our interests. We all need to be watching them. It pisses me off because that isn't how I want to use my time. But it's my future they're messing with.
    
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Republicans used to be against big government, and for local government. What happened? Now they're against anything that is a watchdog and they protect anything that's big (I mean BIG) if they or their friends can own it. They're inconsistent--they're against a big jobs program, but how else will all these unemployed people get to work?

They all need to quit playing power games or we should just abolish both parties. Seriously. I've got news for you, political parties, YOU are NOT Too Big To Fail.
    
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the occupy groups can't stay leaderless. if they try they'll get taken over the way the rich jerks took over the tea party. It matters because if it gets corrupted we will need to start all over to do what I hope the people in those occupy groups are trying to do now.
    
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I'm not rich but I want to be. If we let all you Socialaists redistribute wealth, nobody can ever be rich no matter how hard they work.
    
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Remember Elizabeth Warren, the brilliant woman who created the Consumer Protection Agency? It had to be just a White House “office” because the Republicans would not allow her or the agency to go into effect. Search her name at YouTube. Great rant by her on how conservatives don't want any government interference with them doing whatever they want, but as she says, “You took your goods to markets on roads the rest of us paid for and maintain!” - Sally J
    
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I wasn't going to ever vote again because I am so thoroughly pissed with all the BS. Endless BS. Like that big mountain of real BS you see at the cattle feed lot alongside I-5 when you go up the Central Valley. (Did I learn about that from you?)

Then I started reading about all the ways the Republicans are trying to keep people from voting in different states.

I was talking to my aunt the other night about it and we started taking about the 60s. She is sort of an old hippie chick who gets happy and sad all at the same time when she talks about those olden days.

Then we started talking about Occupy Wall Street. She read me your article on her iPad. I left feeling like we may have another chance at Power to the People. Peace out.
    
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Hey rich people. Question. How much is enough for you? How much do you need? Sure as hell must be a lot less than you want. Have you talked to anybody else lately? Not at the Country Club, but like at the barber shop? The rest of us are trying to figure out how to make what we need and for most of us, that seems to be about all we believe we can want.
    
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THAT is too damn long. Surprised I made it through. But I did and I felt like I needed to read it all. That's an accomplishment for me. And you.
    
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So one day I'm skating at Venice Beach and I see all these crosses. I talk to the people and learn they represent soldiers killed in Iraq. I get on mailing lists. I don't want to be an activist. But I can't seem to just skate with all my free time. In addition to all the crazies, I keep seeing things that get me to stop and ask somebody what it's about, and I get on some mailing list again. Then one of those lists gets me to Occupy Los Angeles (somebody said don't write LA or it looks like Louisiana). Maybe I'm the 1% they all talk about. I am a trust fund baby and I never need to work or worry. But I see too much to be happy that way. Everybody needs to contribute. When they don't we get occupiers. And that is a good thing.
    
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Pieta Brown has donated a song and all the sale proceeds to Occupy Wall Street. You missed that.
    
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It could be worse. We could all be in Wisconsin where 53,000 state employees are all losing their health insurance, because Gov. Scott Walker hates government employees. Or Ohio where Gov. John Kasich hates public employees just as much, and wants to take away their bargaining rights when their union contracts are up.

When these people talk about cutting the budget and reducing government spending, that's what they mean. So don't be surprised if your daughter's teacher gets sick and can't come to work because she can't afford a doctor, or a firefighter gets hurt and can't get medical care to put her on the fire truck again, or a policewoman is in a car crash and can't get physical therapy to go back to work.

Every time it happens we have lost someone we spent money to train for their job. That's looking out for taxpayers? - Emily
    
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YES we need a new WPA and CCC! I had to read up to see what that was and now that I know, I know we need it. Everybody else who doesn't know: WPA is Works Projects Administration, the thing that put lots of people to work doing very fine things during the Depression. CCC is Civilian Conservation Corps and it could do like before and put people to work outdoors helping the environment. - Lisa
    
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Thanks for a good read and making me wish I wasn't working every minute of my life to keep my family fed. If I could I would be there to Occupy L.A. - Seth
    
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You go, Larry! Too many of us artists are way too into ourselves and how we can make the money for the recording studio and to cut the record and to go on tour. I am embarrassed when I think about how little I read outside that world. If you had written that about Occupy Wall Street and posted it someplace else, I never would have seen it and it's not likely that I would have read anything else about it. You hooked me because you made it about the part artists have. I should write a song and go there and sing it form them. Except you're supposed to write about what you know, so I should go first, then write it. Okay, you got me.
    
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I can't believe they keep getting away with it. They are managing, by degrees, to make everything about Obama and his “failures.” Wake up people! Bush and Cheney and their fat cat friends did this to us and now their friends in congress have covered their tracks and stopped anything else from moving. Obama f'd up when he decided not to prosecute the treasonous thieves who profited from his imperialistic wars. If they were behind bars, they would have sent the right message! - PB
    
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If you've ever heard Joan Baez sing “I Dreamed I Saw Joe Hill Last Night” you know where this is going. The bosses will hire thugs to “restore order” after they send infiltrators to cause violence and provide provocation for inflicting their violence on the protestors. The fact that the movement hasn't declared a single set of clear demands scares the bosses even more, because whatever manipulations they make with our money might cause something else to be added to the eventual set of demands. The bosses are afraid, and when anyone powerful gets scared, they become very, very dangerous. - Les
    
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Our dear departed friend Fred Starner would have loved the whole Occupy thing and been there writing songs every day to sing with everyone on his banjo.
    
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America is supposed to be stronger because of our diversity.

What I'm seeing makes me doubt that.

Obama's enemies seem really racist like “OMG one of THEM is in our WHITE House.”

The anti-immigrant thing is aimed against Mexicans.

TV is filled with commercials for travel sites and financial planning companies that have 10,000 planners. I can't afford to go anywhere and I haven't got any money to invest in anything. These commercials run on news shows that tell us how public opinion polls keep getting stronger in favor of the protestors.

It's starting to look like there are only two kinds of diversity: the haves and the have nots.
    
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I hope you get around to posting all the comments because you had some very thoughtful ones last time you did an arts / politics story. This one certainly should be bringing plenty more.
    
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The top 1% are only the top when it comes to income, not ethics or values.
    
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None of the nobility in the castles of the Middle Ages controlled as much wealth as these thieves. In fact, the thieves back then were the heroes, like Robin Hood, who robbed the rich and gave to the poor. I think I'll buy some green tights.
    
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Isn't this really about making us all so damn desperate that we will throw our hands up and let them do whatever they want because it might employ us? That means they could abolish all environmental laws and get back to belching poison gas and toxic smoke and poisoning our waterways and our food. There is a lot at stake here.
    
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The Bible says it's easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get into heaven.
    
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There are more music performance shows on tv now than ever and I should be into that. I'm not. I'm too worried about whether any of us who are not rich will have any future, and whether any of us who are artists will need to work for some big corporation to have a career. If so, I don't think I can do that.
    
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I liked you on the radio and I never knew until recently that you were into all this. I don't know what you would be like on TV but MSNBC still needs a replacement since Keith Olbermann is gone to a cable channel I don't get. - PK
    
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Isn't there a law that you can't cry “Fire” in a crowded theater? Why hasn't everybody at Fox News been arrested for the alarmist [expletive] and lies they keep telling about Occupy Wall Street?
    
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This week in The Nation Magazine is a story everyone should read, called How the Austerity Class Rules Washington. Really shows us where we stand, with Occupy and us in the 99% on one side and the corporate owned politicians protecting the new Gilded Age on the other.
    
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I thought I was probably with the occupy peeps. Now I know I am. Thanks. - Allie
    
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Later this month is the anniversary of Black Friday, the first time Wall Street crashed, in 1929. Some of them jumped out the windows from high up. Just thinking...
    
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Thoughtful and thorough piece. Why aren't you writing for the Times? - Gary
    
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Warren Buffet is a mensch. Is he the only rich guy in this whole country who is? - Steve
    
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If u r right about who is part of this, the fatcats better be scared, really scared. It's time they got scared. I've been scared long enough, about never getting another real job, about whether I can pay registration and insurance to keep driving my car, about how I can pay rent and utilities every month with winter coming and a high bill for heat. It's about time the rich felt the kind of scared that we live with because of what they've done to us to get richer and richer at our expense.
    
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I hope the Occupy Wall Street protestors can do to the Democrats what the Tea Party did to the Republicans. The Democrats need to know the people will kick them out if they don't do what we want. The only reason Obama can win again is because the Republicans listen to the 1% and the Democrats MIGHT listen to the 99%. The Tea Party told the R's, if they don't listen, they're gone and now the R's are scared of them. The D's need to figure out fast that if they don't listen to the 99%, they are WAY gone. The ones who will not be gone are the Occupiers. This Occupy thing won't go away as long as people are hurting and the economy is bad. The 1% stole so much and rigged things so much and the economy will stay bad for a long time unless the D's do something BIG and FAST.
    
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I talked with you once after a concert and you were thinking of moving to another country. I've been thinking about that. Everywhere else has high taxes but people don't go without health care so they are more productive and they seem to be happier. Except Greece, where greed set in and some people took too much and crashed the economy. I've been thinking about that, too, and about this country, and about what makes things go wrong.
    
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I was so disgusted with Obama that I didn't plan to vote. But the Republicans being protectors of the fat cats pushed me over the edge. Barack, you don't do much and I wish you would yell and get angry about what they've done that hurts the whole country whenever your enemies try to hurt you. But at least you aren't out to screw me over like the Republicans.
    
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I'm at OCCUPY right now. What u wrote was far more accurate than the treatment we get from big media. Thank you! I'm saying “we” and this is just my third time here! It really is a “we” thing!!
PS - Come down and sing with us!!
    
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I hate politics. You don't KNOW how much. I always hated it when you went all political with something in the Acoustic Americana Music Guide. But I'm glad you wrote about Occupy Wall Street. I can't ignore this movement. It might be the last chance for us 99%ers to have a future before we're all just underpaid servants to the rich 1%.
    
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How DARE you!?? Not you. I mean those Wall street crooks. You wrote of artists at the Occupy protest (I wasn't sure if you meant New York or LA) singing songs about “fat cats whose lack of concern rivals the aristocrats' “Let them eat cake” cliche of the French Revolution.”

I want to hear those songs and I know for sure I will enjoy them!

The French got it right twice. First when they overthrew their 1% who were robbing everyone else 200 years ago. Next in 2003 when they told Bush to shove it and wouldn't send their troops to help him invade Iraq. Vive la France! I love France.

Those pro-war/anti France lamebrains who changed French Fries to Freedom Fries are the same ones protecting the fat cats now. Vive la French Fry! Too bad the guillotine has gone out of style, we could slice more than potatoes. Liberte, Equalite, Fraternite! Viva l'occupiers!
    
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You and Robert Reich are my heroes. You are the ONLY ones who see the way out of this is to bring back the WPA and the CCC. I majored in Economics and American History. This is worse than the Panic of 1906. This is a real Depression, and the only reason anybody can deny it is because a few FDR programs are still with us, like Unemployment Insurance, Food Stamps, Aid to Families with Dependent Children and General Relief. A record number of Americans are now collecting one or more of these. What more do the politicians need to know?

Tomorrow I'm going to check out the Occupy protest. Depending what I find there, they might become my heroes, too.
    
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I've been unemployed two years. I just read that most employment agencies are forbidden by their client companies to send applicants unless the job seeker already has a job. Is that the kind of “private sector solution” that Romney talks about? What a dope.
    
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MY job was shipped overseas. It's a Recession when your neighbor loses his job. It's a DEPRESSION when you lose yours.
    
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Class warfare? Sign me up. I am so totally tired of working for no benefits and watching the rich get richer by making money with OUR money and not contributing ANYTHING.
    
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I lost my job. I lost my house. I lost my family when my wife divorced me rather than live with an unemployed guy in debt. It wasn't me that started drinking a lot. It was her. Now I worry about her driving with my kids. If I had money I'd hire a lawyer and go for full custody. But how would that work? I'm the guy. I'm supposed to work to support the kids. Right. I'm supposed to be at work all day, not be home with kids to make sure they aren't killed by a drunk driver mother. I can't even support them. I can't support a decent job search. Where's the private sector solution to this? They got their taxes cut to be job creators didn't they? Or where is the government? I'd look overseas for work except for my kids. All that matters to me is my kids.
    
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You make reference to the French Revolution. That's scary. We all know how that one turned out. If these Occupy yellers and screamers pick a leader, I'm going to call him Robespierre.
    
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THANK YOU!!! once again u have shown us artists doing what we're supposed to be doing, speaking and singing with the people, and for the people, and confronting the nation's conscience!!!
    
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I found it odd that you did a feature on Steve Jobs (informative, BTW) just ahead of the revealing one on Occupy Wall Street. Then I saw (I think) that you were making a statement by placing them that way. Steve Jobs was big corporate and all but he was all about making actual things that people would want and could buy. His devices are real. Wall Street has been about confidence schemes and shell games and there is no pea under any of the shells.
    
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really really well written and explains a lot that we're not getting from tv coverage.
    
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I'm grabbing my guitar and going down there. I thought they were whack jobs but now I know who they are. They're me.
    
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Once again you have nailed it. You write long pieces but they're always worth the time it takes to read them. Here's why I wanted to say that. Whenever I read something like this that you write, I can slam the ignorant comments from my Sunday TV football buds. Thanks. I was so tired of one of them who's always talking Rush Limbaugh and Glen Beck and Bill O'Reilly, the loudmouths one of my other buds calls The Axis of Ego.
    
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 Entire contents copyright (c) 2011, Lawrence Wines & Tied to the Tracks. All rights reserved.  
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The LATEST EDITION of THE ACOUSTIC AMERICANA MUSIC GUIDE, with separate links for:
  
1) the latest NEWS FEATURES, with feature stories / reviews / editorials / current acoustic music happenings / "heads up" notices to buy advance tickets for shows likely to sell-out / news you can't find anywhere else from and about the world of acoustic and Americana music and artists;
  
2) the latest SPOTLIGHT EVENTS section, with new and updated info on festivals / artist workshops / schedules and calendars for concerts, club gigs, live music happenings, acoustic & Americana music-related events / and more;
  
3) The Guide's VENUE DIRECTORY of over 500 acoustic music-friendly venues in Southern California – the places TO HEAR MUSIC, or CONTACT TO GET GIGS.
  
It's all available 24/7 (& frequently updated!) at ~  
  
             www.acousticmusic.net or at   
             www.acousticamericana.blogspot.com    
  
- or follow any of the links in the fifteen web sites and web groups that carry the Guide’s weekly News Features.  
  
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