Y'know?

Before I get into today's update I hafta say something. Yeah, I know I've said it before... a lot! But this week has been just another string of fleeting moments that let remind me how lucky I am as both an artist and as a man.

This week I had an interview with Stephanie Simon of NY-1 that will air next week... heard about another article by a fellow artist-soul and writer named Jennifer Hamady in a magazine... heard about another sweetly written article in a local New York newspaper by a man named Ed Grimm... received tons of email coming in from all over about a documentary that is still making its way all around the country on PBS TV stations.

I mean... I'm an independent songwriter. I have been for a long time. As part of that journey, I also get to be "That Guitar Man from Central Park". It's a good, good gig. I'm an American singer/songwriter... a folk singer. I love the job description: Write songs and sing them for people. I tell stories about my Life, my own experience of this world and how it looks through the eyes of a "possibility-junkie" like me. I get to share thoughts and feelings which are sometimes intimate or seemingly isolated... share them with people I don't even know, who in turn email me through this website to tell me that they were happy to find out they are not alone. I do my best to use my art and my work as a "mirror" to reflect the world around me, and sometimes as a "hammer" to help shape the world around me in whatever small way I can. I choose words carefully to try to comfort the disturbed... and disturb the comfortable. Sometimes in a song, I will try to gentle tap on a shoulder as to ask, "What if?" And sometimes I'll write a song to try to not-so-gently kick a door down that is blocked by fear and anger. Sometimes I do it really, really well. Other times... not-so-much. It's a lifelong process.

Click on each photo for larger image.
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And I've gotten to do this every warm Saturday afternoon for the past 20 years on a patch of grass in Central Park in the middle of the capitol of the world -- in a little world we've created called... "The Hill".

So often when I take moment to really pay attention, which I try to do every day, it hits me again.

Holy shit.

This is so cool.

It's Good. It's really a Good Life.

Now for every 100 email messages I receive that reflect the fun, and the humanity, and the Love in all of this, I get one or two from people who just don't "get it". I completely understand. I'm cool with all of that. ('Cause if I don't get some really juicy hate-mail occasionally, then I'm just not doing my job!)

Still, most people get what I'm about and what my music has to say. They're on the same path, I guess. It's kind of the reason I named one of my albums "I Love the Company".

Like, okay... this past week we were rained out on Friday night for The Sunset Concert Series in The Village. But on Saturday the Sun came back out and I headed to "The Hill" with my guitar. Over the course of that afternoon I was joined by Teresa Reynolds who got up to sing a whole bunch of songs with me. My old buddy, Dodger (Roger Bartlett - formerly of Jimmy Buffet's Coral Reefer Band) surprisingly showed up with his axe and sat in on a handful of songs. Hundreds of strangers over the course of the day sang together, laughed together, shed a few sweet tears together, SKIPPED together... it was so very f*cking cool. I mean, Mr. Sid Bernstein, the man who brought The Beatles to America, was hangin' out with us for while and he signed a few posters for Beatles fans from different parts of the world. I got to spend an afternoon with over a thousand new friends.

Thank you. To every single one of you.

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Here's a link to that article in PSYCHOLOGY TODAY

And here's a link to Mr. Grimm's article in Upper West Side Now.

I'll let you guys know when the NY1 piece airs... probably this coming Monday.

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Okay!

Hey...I know the weather is lookin' a little sketchy all week, and tomorrow night's sunset might be in jeopardy again. But check back tomorrow afternoon. I'll try to keep you updated. I'm hoping we can get it in this week!

Now listen, if you're new around here I really hope you bookmark this page and check back every day. I've got 2 brand new songs I'm working on right now and I think I'll make one of them available as a free download... maybe this week. And I think you're gonna wanna keep up with the progress on the new "Broadway" project as it develops. (You might even wanna be a very real part of it's development. More about that further down the page.)

AND! If you're new you can always go back and browse through THE ARCHIVE as far back as you wanna go. I mean... thanks to my friend, my webmaster, and resident evil genius James Marino, you can historically go back through this website all the way back through the Bush years right up until the present. It's really kinda freaky how much content is here on this site.... cartoons, free songs, Photoshop images. Very cool.

And the Photo Galleries just keep growing. (Maybe you're in there!!!).

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Click to visit last year's gallery

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BTW -- "The Something'th Annual Year End Concert" is booked for Saturday night, December 10th. I know it's early, but I wanted to let you know if you're one of those people who travel down from Buffalo, or in from Pennsylvania, or Maryland, or Germany just for this gig.

The internet has made the world a very small campus and that's a really cool thing.

You might find you smile more than you don't and you also might find some things to think about.

KEEP HOPE ALIVE

TOM CRUISE SCARES ME

Mostly, I hope you feel that... "It's Just Us" feeling. You're not alone.

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Okay now you can find out how YOU can be a part of this new project here.

In a nutshell, we're putting together something that we hope is headed for Broadway or... Jupiter... or... I don't know. But it's gonna be done someplace. Broadway legend, TONY WALTON, a man who has more Tony Awards and Academy Awards than I have socks, is behind it 100%... so now it's just about getting the right team together and working it. I'll be inviting all of you to another one of those small, unplugged work sessions very soon, so keep checking back. The last 2 filled up in a matter of hours.

Here's a little 10-minute video from Tony and his wife... explaining the project.

Click to watch the video

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And here's a link to visit if YOU wanna be a real part of this process.

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VIDEO TIME

Here's another song that can't end up in the project 'cause I didn't write it. But it's a fun moment from last year's "Year End Concert".

Click to watch

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Here are a couple of different fun galleries to check out.

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HAVE FUN TODAY!!!!!! (And be cool to each other, okay?)

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Thanks for everything.

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Peace ☮