Anonymous’ Life’s Work
On the administration page for the A Life’s Work blog there are all sorts of boxes full of stats. Like everyone else, I’m obsessed with the numbers, so the first thing I check are how many views the blog received. … Continued
A Present for You – Some Classical Guitar Music
It was unseasonably warm for the end of October, so I took my guitar and digital recorder into the field at VCCA. I sat on the bench part of Craig Pleasants‘ sculpture, Heliotrope, and played a minuet by Henry Purcell … Continued
Imperfect Life, Perfect Record of Life
I met Karen Ramos, a most excellent singer-songwriter, at Blue Mountain Center in 2010. We played music for each other. I happen to know two songs, Girl from Ipanema and Moon River, and they worked for her so I played … Continued
Sweet Briar College – Guest Artist, The Guy Making A Life’s Work
I did my stint as guest artist at Sweet Briar College and I’m happy to report that it went very well. After consulting with the teacher, Paige Critcher, we decided it might be more beneficial if I showed my earlier, … Continued
Documentary Dilemmas: The Neverending Stories
Before I shot a second of A Life’s Work, I grappled with the documentary dilemma. How do you end a film that doesn’t have an ending? (How do the Maysles end Grey Gardens? They show us a looming change of season.) I … Continued
Guest Artist: Me!
On Wednesday I’ll be a wearing my visiting artist’s hat and showing A Life’s Work to a group of BFA students at Sweet Briar College. It’s something arranged through VCCA as a way to expose students to work and artists … Continued
Off to VCCA
I’m off to the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. I’ve been there twice before and it’s always been good to me. Why am I going this time? To write. I’ve been working on the film all summer and need … Continued
Ross McElwee
For your reading pleasure, here’s some non-A Life’s Work work. Here’s a link to a short interview I conducted with Ross McElwee for Filmmaker Magazine. And my review of McElwee’s most recent film, Photographic Memory for Extra Criticum. The short version: … Continued
Editing a Setback Sequence – Process
Previously, on A Life’s Work blog In a previous post I wrote about the process of editing a clip from the Black Gospel Music Restoration Project Program section of A Life’s Work. Since I’ve been working on the subsequent section of … Continued
Los Straitjackets and Yasujiro Ozu
I recently saw Los Straitjackets perform (with special guests the World Famous Pontani Sisters, a burlesque act) here in NYC. I’ve seen them several times before and they always manage to entertain. But somewhere in the middle of one of … Continued