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Issue 6 - Fall 2007 - The Sound Issue
Featured Contributors
;) MEL & TONIN
"The Papa! The Papa! Tradition!"
Mel & Tonin ("The Papa! The Papa! Tradition!") are lifelong friends bonded by a shared passion for musical theater. They have written over 12,000 theater reviews, none of which have been published. Mel lives in ’Frisco, Tonin in Bayside, Queens.
;) DANA FERINE
“Got Myself a Cryin’, Talkin’, Sleepin’, Walkin’, Livin’ Doll”
Dana Ferine (“Got Myself a Cryin’, Talkin’, Sleepin’, Walkin’, Livin’ Doll”) is currently working on a self-help book entitled The Music of Italian Movement: How to Express Yourself without Really Trying (2008). She played with paper dolls from her mother’s McCall’s magazine as a young girl and as a result is now a Marxist feminist.
;) DAVY ROTHBART
“Bigger and Deffer”
Davy Rothbart (“Bigger and Deffer”) makes Found magazine, contributes frequent stories to public radio’s This American Life, and is the author of the story collection The Lone Surfer of Montana, Kansas (Touchstone 2005). His work has been featured in The New Yorker, The New York Times, and High Times. He lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
;) JONATHAN AMES
"Cat Stevens"
Jonathan Ames ("Cat Stevens") is the author of seven books, including Wake Up, Sir! (Scribner 2004) and The Extra Man (Scribner 1999). His graphic novel, The Alcoholic, illustrated by Dean Haspiel, will be published by DC Comics in 2008. Photograph by Travis Roozée ;) HILLARY FRANK
"Me & MC"
Hillary Frank (“Me & MC”) is the author and illustrator of the novels Better Than Running at Night (Houghton Mifflin, 2002) and I Can’t Tell You (Houghton Mifflin, 2004). She is also a contributor to a variety of public radio programs, including This American Life, Studio 360, and Weekend America.
;) REVA MANN
Reva Mann ("Frank Zappa") grew up in central London as the daughter of a wellrespected rabbi. In her early twenties, she moved to Israel, where her grandfather was Chief Rabbi. She writes a personal column for the London Jewish News and the Boston Jewish Advocate, and is currently working on a messianic novel. She lives in Jerusalem with her three children. Her memoir The Rabbi's Daughter is out from Dial Press.
;) MARK SCHWARTZ
"Players Club"
Mark Schwartz ("Players Club") spent his twenties learning mambo and his (early) thirties homesteading in the remains of the Borscht Belt in New York’s Catskill Mountains. His research on the glory days of Latin music in the Jewish community is posted, occasionally, at www.mamboniks.com.
;) JON NATCHEZ
"Paul Simon's Graceland"
Jon Natchez ("Paul Simon's Graceland") is a musician and occasional writer living in Brooklyn. He is a member of several groups, including Beirut, Bishop Allen, the Citizens Band, Escort, and Stars Like Fleas. His cat wishes he hadn’t bought that trombone.
;) JONATHAN KARP
"Killing Tin Pan Alley"
Jonathan Karp ("Killing Tin Pan Alley") is an associate professor of Jewish history at Binghamton University, SUNY. He has written extensively on the relationship between Jewish economic life and cultural activity.
;) RAYMOND LEON ROKER
"Black Sabbath"
Raymond Roker ("Black Sabbath") has gone from working as a graffiti artist to founding the music and culture magazine URB in the early 1990s, and later URB.com. His musical tastes stretch beyond even the panoramic scope of his media company and include dirty Southern rap, the soundtracks from Jesus Christ Superstar and Hair, and British drum & bass. It must be his upbringing in places like the Bahamas, New Orleans, and L.A.’s Miracle Mile.
;) ARON HELLER
"My Aunt Jeanette"
Aron Heller ("My Aunt Jeanette") is an Israeli/Canadian/American journalist who has worked in all three countries. He is currently based in Jerusalem as a correspondent for the Associated Press. In his free time, Aron is the “Voice of Israel Baseball,” calling play-by-play for the fledgling league.
;) ELI HOROWITZ
"Tina Turner's 'What's Love Got to Do with It?'"
Eli Horowitz ("Tina Turner's 'What's Love Got to Do with It?'") grew up in Virginia and now lives in San Francisco. He edits and designs books for McSweeney’s.
;) BEN GREENMAN
"Fragments from Sodom and Gomorrah! The Musical"
Ben Greenman ("Fragments from Sodom and Gomorrah!" The Musical) is an editor at The New Yorker. He is the author of several books of fiction, including Superbad, Superworse, and the recently published A Circle Is a Balloon and Compass Both (MacAdam Cage, 2007). He lives in Brooklyn.
;) SHOSHANA BERGER
"Jeff Buckley"
Shoshana Berger ("Jeff Buckley") is the editor in chief of ReadyMade magazine. She lives in Berkeley with her husband and daughter, Pocket. She hopes the eighties revival is almost over.
;) TONY MICHELS
"I Am Not Hippy Johnny"
Tony Michels ("I Am Not Hippy Johnny") teaches American Jewish history at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. His book, A Fire in Their Hearts:
Yiddish Socialists in New York was published in 2005 by Harvard University Press. ;) ALBERT MAYSLES
"Cornet"
Albert Maysles ("Cornet") is a pioneer of direct cinema who, with his brother David, was the first to make nonfiction feature films (Gimme Shelter, Salesman, Grey Gardens). He has received numerous awards, including an Academy Award nomination for LaLee’s Kin. In 1999, Eastman Kodak saluted him as one of the world’s 100 finest cinematographers.
;) LEON BOTSTEIN
"How We Listen"
Leon Botstein ("How We Listen") is music director of the American Symphony Orchestra and the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra and has been president of Bard College since 1975. Among his most recent recordings are Dukas’s Ariane et Barbe-Bleue and Popov’s Symphony No. 1, Op. 7 (Telarc), which was nominated for a 2006 Grammy Award. Photograph © Steve Pyke ;) JOSH KUN
"How We Listen" and "Far-Out Fred"
Josh Kun ("How We Listen" and "Far-Out Fred") is a professor in the Annenberg School for Communication and the Department of American Studies and Ethnicity at the University of Southern California, where he also directs the Popular Music Project at the Norman Lear Center. He is the author of Audiotopia: Music, Race, and America (UC Press) and a contributor to The New York Times, Los Angeles Magazine, and Tu Ciudad Los Angeles. His book of music essays, Frequencies, will be published in 2008 by Duke University Press. Photograph by Ari Michelson. Josh Kun (left) is pictured with Fred Katz ;) ELINOR LIPMAN
"Leonard Bernstein"
Elinor Lipman ("Leonard Bernstein") is the award-winning author of eight novels, including My Latest Grievance, Then She Found Me, and The Inn at Lake Devine. She divides her time between Northampton, Mass., and West 57th Street.
;) ARI Y. KELMAN
"The Girl in the Silk Skullcap"
Ari Y. Kelman (left) is an assistant professor of American Studies at UC Davis ("The Girl in the Silk Skullcap"). He teaches about popular culture, but is just as concerned with unpopular culture.
;) JOSH RADNOR
"Joni Mitchell's Blue"
Josh Radnor ("Joni Mitchell's Blue") currently stars as Ted Mosby in the CBS hit comedy How I Met Your Mother. He spends most of his money at the iTunes store.
;) MILTON GLASER
"Ravel’s Boléro"
Milton Glaser ("Ravel’s Boléro") is among the most celebrated graphic designers in the United States. He has had one-man shows at the Museum of Modern Art and the Georges Pompidou Center. In 2004 he won the lifetime achievement award of the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum. In 1974 he opened the design firm Milton Glaser, Inc., which he continues to run today. Photograph by Matthew Klein ;) ALAN LIGHT
“Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before”
Alan Light (“Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before”) is the former editor in chief of Spin and Vibe magazines, and a former senior writer for Rolling Stone. He is the author of The Skills to Pay the Bills: The Story of the Beastie Boys, and a two-time winner of the ASCAP Deems Taylor Award for excellence in music writing.
;) JAMIE GLASSMAN
"Novelty Records"
Jamie Glassman ("Novelty Records") is not known for his musical taste; he is prone to choose talk radio when driving his soft-top around London. Jamie is known as a writer and performer for stage and screen in the U.K. and U.S. He doesn’t actually have a soft-top, but he thinks he would look good in one.
;) JON KALISH
"John Coltrane of the Mandolin"
Jon Kalish ("John Coltrane of the Mandolin") is a freelance newspaper writer, radio reporter, and podcast producer. He shares a loft in Manhattan with his wife Pamela, a painter, and two Siamese cats named Max and Izzy. His radio stories have been heard on National Public Radio for twenty-seven years, and have also aired in Australia, Canada, England, and New Zealand. His newspaper stories have been published in the five New York City dailies, as well as in newspapers around the world via Reuters.
;) ERIN POTTS
"U2"
At age twenty-two, Erin Potts ("U2") produced the Tibetan Freedom Concerts, at which U2 played in 1997. Now thirty-five, she continues to work with musicians and other creative leaders on social issues and enjoys watching her seven-year-old, who recently found similar inspiration in the musicians seeking to engage us in climate change issues at the Live Earth Concerts — even if it was Madonna who inspired him most.
;) JESSE AARON COHEN
"The Beach Boys' Endless Summer"
Jesse Aaron Cohen ("The Beach Boys' Endless Summer") lives in Brooklyn and works as a photo archivist at the YIVO Institute, a Yiddish library and archive in New York. He also plays a synthesizer and drums for the band Professor Murder.
;) ADAM MANSBACH
"Soul Serching"
Adam Mansbach’s ("Soul Serching") last novel was Angry Black White Boy, a San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of 2005. His next, The End of the Jews, will be published in March 2008 by Spiegel & Grau/Doubleday. (For more info on MC Serch, visit www.serchlitemusic.com.)
;) JUDY BATALION
"Sha Shtil!"
Judy Batalion ("Sha Shtil") is a writer and performer based in London. She is currently editing an anthology about comedy audiences, is writer-in-residence at the Women’s Art Library, and is previewing her solo show Totally Chana Senesh. Judy lectures at Central Saint Martins.
;) JEREMY GREENSPAN
"Rush"
Jeremy Greenspan ("Rush") is one half of the musical duo Junior Boys. Photograph by Timothy Saccenti ;) JONATHAN Z.S. POLLACK
"Who's Yehoodi?"
Jonathan Z.S. Pollack ("Who's Yehoodi?") teaches history at Madison Area Technical College. He is working on a history of Madison’s Jewish community for the University of Wisconsin Press. He was also the drummer for the klezmer band Yid Vicious, and a guest popular-culture expert for Wisconsin Public Radio.
;) ANNE COOK
"Chaiphy"
Despite the tribulations expressed in “Chaiphy,” Anne Cook still manages a gang of rappers and punk rockers. She lives in the white liberal Mecca known as San Francisco and is keepin’ it real in the Bay with her own entertainment company.
;) PETER MITCHELL
"And who by fire, who by water, who in the sunshine, who in the night time"
Twenty-nine-year-old Toronto-based artist Peter Mitchell ("And who by fire, who by water, who in the sunshine, who in the night time") has been in the illustration racket since graduating from Sheridan College in 2002. Since then, he has worked for publications such as the Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, Saturday Night magazine, The Globe and Mail, and countless others. Peter’s work has been recognized by American Illustration and Applied Arts, and hangs in the collections of Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, and Paul Quarrington. This is the first job in which Peter has managed to incorporate hang gliders.
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