Dr. D.A. Henderson | Smallpox: The Death of a Disease

October 30, 2009 | Comments Off

Interview with Dr. D.A. Henderson [12:44m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

From Wikipedia:

Donald Ainslie Henderson, known as D.A. Henderson, is an American physician and epidemiologist, who headed the international effort during the 1960s to eradicate smallpox. As of 2005, he is a Resident Scholar at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s Center for Biosecurity and a professor of public health and medicine at the University of Pittsburgh. He is also a Johns Hopkins University Distinguished Service Professor and Dean Emeritus of the School of Public Health, with a joint appointment in the Department of Epidemiology. Dr. Henderson is the author of, ‘Smallpox: The Death of a Disease.’

Posted by jamie | Filed Under Science, Health, History, Medicine, AUTHOR INTERVIEW, PODCAST

Glenn Bachman | The Green Business Guide

October 29, 2009 | Comments Off

Dr. Kent: Welcome to Sound Authors. We have four fantastic guests on the show today. Three authors, and one musician. We’re doing a show of course in the traditional format of Sound Authors. We’ve scheduled this show quite a while ago, and that’s why we’re back to the four-segment method. Again, tune in next week and the week after. We’re doing brand new varieties of shows with all sorts of different kinds of guests. Always authors and musicians: Sound Authors both. At the end of the show we’re going to talk to a musician. His name is Jacob Moon. He’s based in Hamilton. A wonderful singer/songwriter. Before that, we’re going to talk to the author of ‘Skinny Bitch,’ Rory Freedman, a New York Times bestselling coauthor. They’ve sold millions of books literally. Before that, at 3:15 or so, we’re going to talk to Dr. D.A. Henderson, the author of ‘Smallpox: Death of a Disease.’ In this world right now where we’re always talking about the H1N1, let’s talk about smallpox and the havoc it wreaked. Without further ado, at the beginning of the show, I’ll be talking to Glenn Bachman. Glenn has more than 30 years of experience in improving the economic and environmental performance of organizations and products. His book is called ‘The Green Business Guide.’ Welcome to the show, Glenn Bachman.

Glenn Bachman: Thank you so much.

Dr. Kent: Tell me about this book: ‘The Green Business Guide.’ Green stuff has been really hot for the last couple of years, and with the Obama presidency, it’s gotten even more so.

Glenn Bachman: That it has. The guide is intended to be a blueprint or a roadmap for small and medium sized businesses. What I have found in looking around as to what could be used as a roadmap if a business or an organization wanted to go green was not very detailed in the nuts and bolts of the how-to. I found that a lot of businesses understood why they would want to go green, but they didn’t really understand what it was that it would mean in detail. So what I had decided to do was to write a book that would consolidate different resources from all over the place, whether it’s from environmental organizations, EPA, business best-practices, my own experience, and pull that together in a single unified document that could be used in making or allowing an organization to go green.

Dr. Kent: What does it mean to ‘go green,’ exactly?

Glenn Bachman: There’s differing concepts on that. I use ‘green’ as ecological friendliness. A lot people use the term ‘green’ and use it as though it was also the same as ’sustainable.’ However, sustainable businesses take not only the ecological friendliness, but they expand that into economic performance as well as social equity issues. Fair-trade, for example, or comparable pay for women and men, things of that nature.

Dr. Kent: And for you, ‘green’ means?

Glenn Bachman: For me, ‘green’ means ecological performance. By ecological performance, I’m talking about ensuring that the business or the organization is using a minimal amount of energy, that the energy that is being consumed is clean energy, that the water use is reduced, that they’re pulling water in minimal amounts from either public or private sources. When they are getting rid of the water, the water is being returned to a natural system with a minimal amount of contaminants or temperature change, or things like that. That packaging is reduced, material use is reduced, and things like that.

Dr. Kent: In business right now, it seems to be quite trendy to say that you’re green, and I know that there’s some things where you can trade some of your electricity against something that’s sustainable, or you could do many things as a business. You can install solar panels on the roof. What does it mean for a business to call themselves ‘green’?

Glenn Bachman: I think that fundamentally what they’re saying is that the way that they’re approaching the delivery of their services or the manufacture or sale of the products that they have is that they are doing it in a manner that is least injurious to the natural environment. You’re right to point out that they’re getting a lot airplay right now, because there’s certainly businesses that aren’t being truthful about being green. They recognize that to call themselves green is a way of taking advantage of what some perceive to be a fad, but that in fact they are not being green, because they’re, for example, reducing their packaging size, but perhaps they still have contaminants that are embedded into the product that they’re selling. That type of green, or non-green, has been dubbed ‘green-washing.’ Sort of like white-washing, only green-washing, where an organization is making claims that it’s green when in fact it is not. I think that what those businesses are doing that are legitimately trying to become green is they are aligning themselves with a greater population of consumers, whether those consumers are individuals or corporations like Wal-Mart, or what have you, that are recognizing that it makes business sense and family sense to go green. That by reducing the impact now it’ll be more likely that we’ll have a more palatable and inhabitable earth decades from now and generations from now.

Dr. Kent: Where’d you get your start in all of this?

Glenn Bachman: I think probably my path for this was from architecture. I was doing construction in high school during the summer, and that turned into architectural design interests in college, which turned into urban planning interests as I was trying to integrate shelter energy production and food production into neighborhoods, and I then became an energy planner working in the northwest where I was doing projects. I did about 50 different energy-related projects in the Pacific northwest as part of this environmental company that I was a partner in. Ecology has probably always been a part of my background. Probably the very first appreciation for that came from my grandfather.

Dr. Kent: When creating a green business guide, we’ve talked about sometimes it’s not necessarily green, but what are the best practices a business could fairly easily implement?

Glenn Bachman: I think part of the best practice is to demonstrate the leadership in the company to say, ‘We want to change the way that we are doing things and become more green.’ The leadership is critical. That’s best practice number one. Best practice number two is probably to engage everybody in the organization to look for opportunities for saving energy, for conserving water, for reducing resource use, things like that. Then, I think that on the nuts and bolts side, probably what you want to be able to do is focus on lighting, that’s probably common to most businesses, and then depending on the nature of the business, a mom-and-pop grocery would be most interested in lighting and refrigeration, whereas warehousing might be more interested in - if it’s non temperature controlled - it might be more interested in transportation issues and how to reduce the impact of moving goods from the warehouse to their point of use.

Dr. Kent: One of the things in this new administration has been green technology can really start to drive the economy. What does that mean, and is that possible?

Glenn Bachman: It is possible. In fact, President Obama just gave a speech today at Massachusetts Institute of Technology which was pretty much a statement of his green philosophy and also I would say in some ways a motivational speech saying ‘Go get ‘em.’ Energy technology and green technologies are moving very rapidly. It’s much like what the computer world was looking like 25 years ago and actually continues to be today. There are really some amazing things that are coming out in terms of developing fuels for transportation out of algae, out of different types of agricultural products. There’s different technologies that are being created on rooftops where shingles can understand what the temperature is and change color to reflect during overheated times so that the solar radiation doesn’t penetrate the building, or the solar radiation doesn’t get absorbed as heat into the building. Or in the wintertime turn into a darker color when it is desirable to have that penetration and to acquire more heat. We’re getting micro wind turbans that can be attached to rooftops that look very small. You would hardly even notice that they are on the rooftop.

Dr. Kent: When you mean micro, do you mean the kind that’s on like a little kids hat, or do you mean really small?

Glenn Bachman: I mean probably a little bit bigger than a little kid’s hat. We’re not going to get a lot of useful energy out of something that small. But think maybe 10-times larger than that.

Dr. Kent: So maybe like two feet tall or something?

Glenn Bachman: Yes, but instead of thinking in the vertical access, think in the horizontal axis, a hamster cage or something like that, running along the full length of a ridge. It can capture the wind energy, transform that into a generated electricity.

Dr. Kent: I’m curious about the roof that changes color. I remember as a kid just walking out along a simple asphalt road how hot it would get. Just color is pretty significant.

Glenn Bachman: It is. That’s one of the reasons why in ‘The Green Business Guide,’ the book, there are a series of recommendations on how to deal with paving: those huge parking lots that we see when we go to malls and outside parking lots when we are in the heat of the summer, when we’re walking across the entrance to the store, we’re boiling out there. So we try to shield those with vegetation: trees that will shade the asphalt and prevent the solar radiation from being absorbed.

Dr. Kent: It’s going to be profitable, but it’s a massive change for a lot of businesses. What is the resistance?

Glenn Bachman: The first set of resistance is that over the years, I think that we’ve seen that green technologies have been expensive. I think that because of that, the perception is that the green technologies are not having a very favorable return on investment. A lot of the greening of a business can be categorized in terms of changes, transformations that are no cost, like reminding people to turn off the lights in the storage room when they’ve gotten their ream of paper out of storage. Or they could be very low cost, such as installing compact fluorescent light bulbs, and removing incandescent bulbs. Those in a full use area have a payback often of six to eight months depending on what the cost of electricity is. And then there’s other costs that are greater. What I encourage the businesses to do is to look for the low-hanging fruit: those things that can be implemented easily with very little goading on the part of management or workers, and then to look at those other programs that can be implemented that would be a relatively short return on the investment. I think that the second thing that we’re seeing is that in the past, a lot of these technologies were not as confidant, as skilled, as efficient, as effective as the ones that they were being designed to replace. An example of those were some of the early fluorescent bulbs that flickered, that hummed, that were a distraction in the workplace, and so folks weren’t installing those. Those problems have been remedied, and as a result of that, there have been greater penetration of those types of programs in action in the workplace. I think that overall, there is just a certain malaise, that this is the way we’ve done business. It’s really not been a focus of attention until the problems associated with the climate change, with the resources, such as petroleum, silver, others that are used in industry, because they’re finite resources, they’re not as available because of the growing clientele of consumers, and as a consequence, the price of a lot of these resources are going up, and if the prices are going up, the operating expenses for the businesses obviously go up. So, they’re looking at ways of just reducing their input in order to stay competitive, and that’s the advantage that they’re seeking.

Dr. Kent: Well it’s so fascinating talking about green business, and I hope to talk to you again sometime. The book is called ‘The Green Business Guide,’ by Glenn Bachman, subtitled, ‘A One-Stop-Resource for Businesses of All Shapes and Sizes to Implement Eco-Friendly Policies, Programs and Practices,’ and of course it’s out on Career Press, and it’s been such an honor chatting with you.

Glenn Bachman: My pleasure.

Dr. Kent: You can find out more online, just again look up, ‘Glenn Bachman’ and ‘The Green Business Guide.’

Posted by jamie | Filed Under Design, TRANSCRIPTS, Business, AUTHOR INTERVIEW, PODCAST

Glenn Bachman | The Green Business Guide

October 29, 2009 | Comments Off

Interview with Glenn Bachman [17:11m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

From Amazon.com:

Glenn Bachman, CMC, AICP, is president of Raven Business Group, LLC, a management consulting firm located in Massachusetts. Combining his expertise in strategic thinking, environmental management, and systems analysis, Glenn’s practice has evolved into sustainability consulting: assisting organizations that desire to become more ecologically and socially responsible, while maintaining their profitability. He has more than 30 years of experience in improving the economic and environmental performance of organizations and projects through consulting and training engagements. Bachman’s portfolio includes Environmental Impact Statements, energy facility cost-benefit analyses, strategic plans, business plans, and environmental audits and reports prepared for business, non-profit organizations, educational and governmental clients. He has a BA from Bowdoin and a masters in planning from the University of Oregon. Glenn is also vice president of the board of the Apeiron Institute for Sustainable Living, a non-profit organization working to promote sustainable practices in Rhode Island area households, businesses, schools, and government, and the author of ‘The Green Business Guide.’

Posted by jamie | Filed Under Design, Business, AUTHOR INTERVIEW, PODCAST

Chris Smither | Time Stands Still

October 27, 2009 | Comments Off

Dr. Kent: My next guest on the show is the incredible musician, Chris Smither. He’s been in the music industry for about four decades now, and has an incredible brand of music. He taps his own feet as the percussion to his music, and often tours with just him and his acoustic guitar, and his tapping shoes. Incredible singer: Chris Smither. I’m going to listen to a song from Chris Smither called, ‘Don’t Call Me Stranger,’ and right after we’re going to be talking to him about his newest album. Here we go, ‘Don’t Call Me Stranger,’ by Chris Smither.

[Music]

Dr. Kent: That’s an amazing tune called, ‘Don’t Call Me Stranger,’ by Chris Smither from his latest album - and what an album it is - called ‘Time Stands Still.’ It’s his eleventh studio album. Welcome to the show, Chris Smither.

Chris Smither: Thank you. How are you?

Dr. Kent: I’m great. I saw you many years ago for the first time in Middlebury, Vermont, at the little coffee house there.

Chris Smither: Was it snowing?

Dr. Kent: I think it was, yes.

Chris Smither: It always snows when I play up there. I play up there every year, and it snows every time I’m up there.

Dr. Kent: It’s amazing to see, I believe that year it was just you and your feet.

Chris Smither: That’s normally the way I play: 99 percent of the time, that’s just exactly how you’ll hear me.

Dr. Kent: This last record of yours, ‘Times Stands Still,’ was produced by David Goodrich, who played with Peter Mulvey for a very long time. I know you and Peter are good friends. I just chatted with him a couple of weeks ago.

Chris Smither: Yes, and in fact that’s how I met Goodie, and then once I spent some time with him, I asked him to help me on a record, and this has been about the third album that we’ve produced together.

Dr. Kent: There’s an amazing sound on this thing. This feels to me like it’s so fresh and new. The sound of that song, it’s nasty, it’s gritty, it’s down on the earth. Tell me about the sound of this album.

Chris Smither: Well, it’s deceptively simple. It’s virtually live. There’s very, very few overdubs on the record, and we could do that because it is so simple. It’s basically just a trio working on the record. The idea for that came from a festival that I played about a year before we started work on the record. It was a festival in Holland. They wanted me to play, but they didn’t want any solo action. I basically always work solo. I said, ‘Well, that’s too bad.’ They said, ‘Can’t you get a band together?’ I said, ‘Maybe I can bring a trio,’ and they said, ‘Well that’ll do.’ So I brought a trio, and we had a wonderful time, I mean it really was a wonderful time. Everybody loved it, including us. They gave me a recording of our set that had been done off the board. I didn’t listen to it for a few weeks, but when I finally did, I said, ‘Well gosh, no wonder everybody liked it!’ I sent it to Dave, and I said, ‘Listen to this. This is the way we should do the next record.’ He listened to it, and he said, ‘Yeah, let’s give it a shot.’ And that’s what happened.

Dr. Kent: Yes, and it still has that feel of solo. It’s still got your feet, and it’s still got the simplicity of the one sound. Maybe David Goodrich kind of has that because he’s done this sort of duo with Peter Mulvey for so many years. Maybe he’s great at making you sound like a soloist.

Chris Smither: He is. He knows what to do to make the sound bigger, but to not at the same time step on what I’m doing. It’s a rare skill. I feel like I’ve been looking all my life for a producer that knew how to do that, and I finally found one.

Dr. Kent: Tell me about your style. You’re a fantastic guitar player, and you’ve got this voice that you’ve been carrying around your whole life. Tell me about how your style has changed.

Chris Smither: It’s just a gradual accumulation of characteristics. I started off listening to Blues guys, [indecipherable] Mississippi John Hurt, guitar players like that, Skip James. Probably that accounts for at least half, if not two thirds of my style. It was a combination of trying to imitate what they were doing and not really succeeding, but at the same time coming up with something that’s valid in it’s own right, and just learning a little bit at a time, trying to figure things out. I’m a self-schooled musician. I always think of myself as not really knowing a whole lot about music, at least not in any formal sense. Gradually, it’s gotten to the point where, if you work at something long enough and keep to yourself, and keep yourself isolated enough, then you’ll start to be recognizable. Whether that will be good or not is something else again, but at least you won’t sound like anybody else. The voice just comes from, as you put it, I’ve been carrying it around my whole life, so it sounds fairly lived in. It’s been a long time.

Dr. Kent: From love songs to political songs, I remember one of the first songs that I really loved, I was exposed to first from Peter Mulvey, and I traced it back to you of course, and that is ‘Every Mother’s Son.’ I especially love that song; it’s just such a unique perspective. Where do songs come from for you?

Chris Smither: Sometimes they come from the newspapers, and that one did. It was a pretty terrible story about some father who’d just killed his son. He was trying to make him be quiet, and he wound up killing him, and didn’t really understand why he’d done it. To me, that was the most poignant part of the story. He just seemed like such an ordinary person. You could hear him talking on TV, because I saw a story about him on television, and it was one of these banal things; if it hadn’t resolved in the death of a young child, it wouldn’t have amounted to anything. It was just so unimportant somehow. To me, that laid the foundation of the song: this could happen to every mother’s son. It could happen to you, it could happen to me. We don’t like to think it could. It just seems like that’s the nature of the thing. That was my perspective on that one. A lot of songs just come right out of the newspaper, and just things that I read. I’ll say, there’s a theme there, there’s an idea there. Something that would support some sort of commentary.

Dr. Kent: That actually reminds me. I’ve heard Tom Waits and his wife Kathleen Brennan, they do that: they mine the newspapers. There’s a hint in that last track we listened to, ‘Don’t Call Me Stranger’ - I heard a tiny bit of Tom Waits in there; maybe I’m wrong.

Chris Smither: It could be. I sort of think it’s coincidental, but at the same time, I’m a fan of Tom Waits, and I’ve known him since his first record, and it wouldn’t be a surprise to me if we came up with the same sound or the same take on a certain kind of thing, because he’s certainly rooted in the same kind of ground as I am. I think there’s a very similar sensibility going on there.

Dr. Kent: There’s real dirt in the music, and at the same time, there’s real melody. That’s what I see. I guess Dylan has kind of come around to that too. Incredible sense of the dirt. Does some of that come free - it seems to me that you were talking about Skip James, and some of those 78s, and on this album there’s a song by Frank Hutchison. Do you love those old 78s, that scratchy sound?

Chris Smither: I’m not so much a fan of the scratchy sound that’s produced by the technology, but in terms of the spiritual dirt, I love that. Dylan in a sense has never gotten away from that. He went through one little day when he tried to sing a little prettier than his natural voice, but it just didn’t work. He’s just let it take its own course. I’m always thinking to myself that people say, ‘Well he’s a terrible singer.’ And I say, ‘Well, no, he’s not a terrible singer. He’s not a pretty singer by any means, but he’s an extremely effective singer.’ He gets it across, you know? That’s what we’re really talking about in terms of what I try to do, and Tom Waits, and Bob Dylan, or anybody else that we’re talking about. It’s the people who are trying to get something across. They’re not trying to just sort of paint a living room a pretty color. They’re trying to tell you something, and if it’s effective, it’s effective, and they’ve accomplished what their aim is.

Dr. Kent: So what do you think about some of the younger musicians, who I believe really did benefit from your playing a whole bunch in their own style, like Peter Mulvey? Do you often get tributes from those folks that say, ‘Your style meant so much to me’?

Chris Smither: I get it all the time, in a sense. I get it in performances. I spend a lot of time talking to people at performances. A lot of players come up and they tell me not only that the guitar playing has done a lot for them, but the writing and the whole concept of how to approach writing a song. It means a great deal to me. I think I’m a little embarrassed by it. At times, I don’t really know how to take it as gracefully as I probably should. At the same time, it’s really something to sit and realize that I’m at an age now that all my heroes were when I started talking to them. I mean, I actually hung out with Skip James. I met [indecipherable]. I talked to all those people when I was just a boy. I think of myself as a boy: I was in my very early 20s. To me, they were these monumental figures. To me, they were as old as the planet it seemed. I was in awe of them. Now I find myself in that same position, and I begin to appreciate how they felt at the time. It’s a different perspective on things. But, you know, I love it. When I was 60 years old, all the younger musicians in Cambridge threw a birthday party for me. They didn’t let me play at all. They all got up on stage and played Chris Smither songs, and it was one of the most exhilarating evenings of my life.

Dr. Kent: You still persist in doing very intimate gigs. You go from living room to living room, and that’s part of the real beauty and charm of the stuff that you do. Why did you make that choice early on, to play the coffee houses and the smaller gigs?

Chris Smither: Basically, I play what I can. It’s not so much a conscious choice as the size of the audience that the music will support. There are markets in the United States where I can play for an audience for about 500, and that’s about as big as any of my shows get. I would say that the majority of my shows now run about 200 people, and there’s probably maybe 15 to 20 percent that are between 75 and 100 people. I will say that the ones that are between 75 and 100 are easily the ones that I enjoy the most, because there’s an intimacy to it that is something that I really look for. I’m almost on a search for it. My whole objective for performing, and I don’t care how big the audience is, my objective is to make everybody feel like I’m sitting in their lap, whispering in their ear [laughs]. I don’t want them to think of me as some performer a long ways off up on the stage; I want to be right in their face. Of course with a small audience, that’s much more easily accomplished.

Dr. Kent: I think a lot of folks that are stuck with the large audiences would completely agree with you. It’s wonderful for the audience, wonderful for you, and it’s great that you’ve been doing it for so long. Tell me a little bit about the song we just heard, ‘Don’t Call Me Stranger.’

Chris Smither: I just realized that it had been a long time since I’d written a ‘bad boy’ song, and I set out to do one. It’s a pretty straightforward seduction piece. The thing that I like about it is it’s long on [indecipherable] but very short on details. It never gets really specific about what’s going to happen, but at the same time, there’s a sort of erotic undercurrent to it, and it’s full of promise, and I really like that. It’s got a pretty damn good line in every verse. It’s hard to argue with a song like that, if you can pull one off: it’s got a good line in every verse, then you sort of go home happy.

Dr. Kent: Tell me about your feet. How did you train your feet as a young man, and how have your feet treated you through the years? Do you go home and have sore feet from being percussive all night?

Chris Smither: It’s not really the feet that get sore; it’s the muscles in the legs that make them go up and down. That’s the hard part. I have never trained my feet at all. It’s something that I cannot help doing. I literally cannot not do it. If somebody held my feet down, it would be extremely difficult for me to play the guitar.

Dr. Kent: And your feet have been guest stars on at least Peter Mulvey’s albums. They have a life of their own now.

Chris Smither: Yes, they do. Drummers actually like my feet. If I’m playing with a drummer, they like them because my feet show them where I feel the pocket, so it’s easier for them to see where I feel it.

Dr. Kent: You’ve got a drummer that plays with you in this trio. What does he do? You’re nailing down the downbeats, and what’s he doing?

Chris Smither: He accentuates, he plays off of what I do. There are some songs on this record where he’s playing musically; he’s not really holding down time at all. He’s just adding little percussive forces to things. I absolutely love it. He doesn’t draw attention to himself, but at the same time, if he wasn’t there, you’d notice it, believe me. You would really notice it. It would be a very different sound, much more stark. He’s got a wonderful way of understanding what it is that I’m trying to do, and emphasizing it without stepping on what I’m doing. He does with the drums exactly what Goodie does on the guitar, which is to kind of amplify the intent without actually duplicating anything.

Dr. Kent: I know you’re in Charlotte right now, and you’re going on to Georgia and Louisiana and all this. Are you doing any dates with the trio?

Chris Smither: I am. That won’t happen for a few weeks. I’ve got to do a West Coast tour, and then a Midwest tour: Chicago and Michigan, places like that. Then when I come back, I’m going to work with the trio up and down the East Coast, I think the Birchmere and Joe’s Pub in New York. There’s a good double-handful of dates that we’re going to do together. I’m looking forward to that.

Dr. Kent: Well it’s such a great, fresh new sound. It’s been an honor talking to you. Tell me a little about ‘Surprise, Surprise.’

Chris Smither: [Laughs] This really is a newspaper song. This is a topical song. I started that song back in the depth of the latest financial debacle, and I was reading the newspaper, and just a verse started coming to me, and I forget which verse it was, but it was all about what a drag it is to think that you’re rich and suddenly find out that you’re poor, through absolutely no action on your own part. By the time I’d gotten up from the breakfast table, I was off into my private little work studio, and I was working away at it. It took me about two or three days to finish, but that’s the story on that.

Dr. Kent: That’s what we need right now. I mean, ‘Surprise, surprise - you are poor. You don’t have health insurance.’

Chris Smither: Whatever it is.

Dr. Kent: Yes. How do audiences respond to that?

Chris Smither: They love it! They scream with laughter. They’re basically laughing at themselves, you know? I have yet to play that song for an audience that didn’t respond extremely favorably.

Dr. Kent: Well, it’s been such an honor. I’ve been talking to Chris Smither. His new album is called ‘Time Stands Still.’ What a sound it’s got, and it’s been a real honor chatting with you.

Chris Smither: Thank you very much.

Dr. Kent: So here’s the song from ‘Time Stands Still,’ called, ‘Surprise, Surprise.’ Let’s listen to it on the way out.

[Music]

Dr. Kent: That’s a great tune called, ‘Surprise, Surprise,’ from Chris Smither, on an amazing album he just put out called, ‘Time Stands Still.’ It’s his eleventh studio album. He’s of course influenced people up and down inside the Folk world, and Blues world. It’s been such an honor chatting with him. On the show today, wow, what a fun show it’s been. At the beginning, I talked to Thomas Childers. He’s an award-winning professor of history. His book was called, ‘Soldier from the War Returning.’ What a fascinating look at the greatest generation’s troubled homecoming from World War II. They really weren’t as far away from the Vietnam vets and Iraq war vets that we know so well with their PTSD and all of that. And then it was an honor to speak to Ronald Kessler. He’s written eighteen books in the nonfiction category, usually really uncovering secret after secret. This last one is a book called, ‘In the President’s Secret Service,’ and it goes behind the scenes with agents in the line of fire and the presidents they protect. Great, great, great insights into Barack Obama’s Secret Service, and George Bush and his daughters, and Dick Cheney, and all sorts of fun, fun things in there. Then talking with Peter Brown, of course, floated my childhood boat, and we talked about his new book, called, ‘The Curious Garden.’ Today, on the day when ‘Where the Wild Things Are’ is coming out in theaters. I’m headed out there tonight to watch that movie. I’m still a child at heart. As I told Peter during the show, his book is ‘three plus,’ because I’m certainly part of his audience. His book is called, ‘The Curious Garden.’ Check out his website; he’s got some really fun stuff for your kids, and for you as well. Then of course speaking to Chris Smither was really my pleasure. His last album, recorded in only three days, was called, ‘Time Stands Still.’ He’s been on the road for more than 30 years, and he’ll come to your town soon. Go check him out. His feet keep tapping and incredible rhythms come out of his guitar. We’ll talk to you the next time. Pick up a great book, and I hope you all have a wonderful week.

Posted by jamie | Filed Under Bluegrass, TRANSCRIPTS, Folk, MUSICIAN INTERVIEW, PODCAST

Chris Smither | Time Stands Still

October 27, 2009 | Comments Off

Interview with Chris Smither [29:52m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

From Wikipedia and his website:

Chris Smither is an American folk/blues singer, guitarist, and songwriter. His music draws deeply from the blues, American folk music, modern poets and philosophers.

Recorded in only three days, ‘Time Stands Still’ is just the eleventh studio album of a career that now spans over four decades. ‘Time Stands Still’ (Signature Sounds/Mighty Albert) is both pensive and visceral – an album whose songs alternately ponder life’s mysteries in some moments, and let them lie undisturbed in others. Featuring eight new original compositions and a song apiece from Bob Dylan, Mark Knopfler, and 1920s country-blues songster Frank Hutchison, ‘Time Stands Still’s’ immediate, intimate sound is the direct result of one gig, and the challenge it presented.

Posted by jamie | Filed Under Bluegrass, Folk, MUSICIAN INTERVIEW, PODCAST

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