It’s that time of year when some of us reflect:
Fun moments
Great meals
Good friends
All the great meals we ate with good friends and now we pretend to make a New Year’s resolution to lose weight, which we will absolutely NOT do (make the resolution OR lose the weight.)
This year, I got to thinking about relationships and how grateful I am for my friends and family.
Here are three friends with creative talent that you too can experience and enjoy.
Larry Deming (www.larrydeming.com) is a brilliant musician whose excellence as a performer, composer and arranger is surpassed only by his (seemingly) limitless patience as a teacher of this particular violin student.
I first met Larry 21 years ago when EK and I were looking for a string quartet to play at our wedding. We found Larry and his Deming String Quartet, and it remains to this day a highlight of our wedding day.
Fast forward about 13 years. I had taken up violin and I wasn’t happy with my instructor, so I said to EK: “What was the name of the guy who played at our wedding?” She remembered, I called Larry and he has been my instructor and friend for about eight years.
And while I would never claim that anyone would want to hear me play, I can say, thanks to Larry’s tutelage, that I can play the violin and mean it.
If you have a moment, check out some of his videos and audio on his web site. I’m especially fond of a string quartet version of Led Zeppelin’s “Kashmir” that the Deming String Quartet performed live on my old radio station, i-95, back in 2017. It’s crazy good.
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Katalina Simon (https://www.katalinasimon.com) and I met when we both worked on the IBM Software Group public relations team back in 1997. Our paths have crossed many times over the years and every time, I am the better for it.
Katalina is an immensely talented photographer. She takes photographs that are stunningly beautiful and arresting and that are infused with artistic and editorial perspectives that these times call for. (In other words, if you’re looking for rainbows and puppies, find another artist.)
Her most recent project, “Waiting for a Knock at the Door”, is commentary and observation on the state of the world right now and specifically the rise of authoritarianism. She does this through a lens of history and personal experience as the child of Hungarian immigrants who escaped communism during the Cold War.
Take a look. I can’t wait to see what she turns her camera to next.
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Jeff Madoff (https://madoffproductions.com) and I met on a week-long bicycle trip through Vermont in 1988 and stayed friends ever since. (Jeff also helped me get the job that introduced me to Katalina.)
Jeff is an award-winning filmmaker, videographer, screenwriter and university instructor who made his bones in the New York City fashion industry.
About 10 years ago, he filmed an interview with the late, great rock-and-roll pioneer, Lloyd Price, who was truly one of the founding fathers along with Elvis and Little Richard. You know Lloyd’s hits, even if you don’t know you know them.
This short film interview inspired Jeff to want to tell Lloyd’s full life story, so he (Jeff) sat down and wrote a draft of a musical about Lloyd’s life. That initial script has wended its way through multiple iterations, to showcases in New York City, to become a full production musical – “Personality” - in 2022 in Malvern, PA, a suburb of Philadelphia and in 2023, a successful run at the Studebaker Theater in Chicago. (Alas, Lloyd died in 2021, before he ever got to see Jeff’s fully staged production.)
If all goes according to plan, the next stop is London’s West End on its way to Broadway.
Lloyd’s is a story that deserves to be told and Jeff’s book for the musical is touching, respectful, funny and joyous. If it makes it to London and then back here, you should travel to see it. I resolve to keep you posted.
So, there you have it. Three creative people you should know about who I am lucky enough to call friends. And yes, I am bragging a bit that I know and get to hang out with such talented people. But if we can’t brag about our family and friends, who else is there?
Wishing you a Happy New year filled with creative endeavors and as much Ozempic as necessary to counteract all those great meals with friends and family.
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