We've often had musicians play musical interludes between the speakers. And tonight The theme is around music and how, how music is so important to our lives. We have some people who've done incredible things with their music careers.
you so much. Yeah, sure. I will play Oh, just really quickly. Hi, everyone, and to hide to the people I know, Cory. Terri, great to see you again. Mentor from the Berklee global jazz Institute. an honor. And yeah, this is a tune called song for Keith. For Keith Jarrett, one of my personal musical heroes. Yeah, his birthday passed three days ago. So this is a tribute to him. Have you enjoy?
I'm about to leave, I'm not going to walk through.
Wow, that was great. So thank you, Max, are you in Spain or Sweden tonight?
I'm in Sweden.
Great. So tonight is all about music, music. And we have some incredible musicians here. And I'm so excited for our community to meet you all. As always, we're recording this. And this is going to be a long form. Audio that we'll post tonight, also, through AI, we're gonna have a transcript of everything that said that so people can read that that'll be up within minutes at the end of the show. And then over the next few weeks, we're going to pull out audio grams of each of our speakers so you can hear what they had to say. And then we're going to edit this into a podcast show a little under an hour. So welcome, everyone to imagination, action. I know James, you're just got off a plane from LA, you're in Rome. And I knew I worked with you recently. And you connected with Steven Spielberg and some others around what you're doing excited for you to share a little bit about that. I know Carolyn, you have, I think a violin that you play on from the 1600s I know you've carried a Stradivarius for a while but I think you have something really special looking forward to people meeting meeting you. Terri, I know you play with Herbie Hancock and he says you're an inspiration and, and you have connections to Dizzy Gillespie and, and you're just a legend. And I'm so proud that for the musicians on here who don't know you that they get to know you and for those who've been mentored by you or know you, it's great to get the band together, Cory and he played the accordion and at one point the accordion was more popular than the guitar and I think you're leading the charge To bring it back and you are the Tom Brady of the accordion, it's great. Great to have you here. And I know Pete, you work with students and veterans and I know after the shooting in, in in Florida, you went and worked with some of the students and I can't wait to hear how you're using music is therapy. And it's always great to have an opera singer. Everyone, don't worry, he won't blow out the microphone. He's played a bunch of times for us. And it's just amazing. Alex, it's so great to have you here. And if you need someone to teach your, your little one chess, he also teaches chess and he's a male model. So, Alex, thanks for joining us. And Hayley Bostonian of the year next year, you're going to be in Germany, living as a singer songwriter in a in a villa you You're like an artist and resident for a city in Germany. So great to have you here. But before we start, Alison, how are you It's great to see you. And I know, you go to the lullaby room, all the time on clubhouse, and we're going to have someone joining a lot of our musicians teach master classes, and one of our musicians is going to come after I think they're teaching a Masters class tonight, and he runs a lullaby room. And you can also set that up. But I know you're really good at following trends. And I think billion dollar companies hold their breath and wait to what you say you're like, yeah. And you've been following the creative economy, and you're really passionate about music. And it's been such a joy, curating these rooms with you. And I'm curious, you know, how would you frame what we're what we're doing tonight, and, and before we hear from our musicians,
Absolutely, john, it's been such a pleasure to team with you all these weeks. And we've covered so many different topics. But as you beautifully said, at the beginning, music is so core to each of our lives. And it's probably never been more critical than in the last year of COVID, where everyone has to manage their own moods and, and it connects all of us together. So it is fantastically important. And it's also a sector that's being completely reinvented. So, for example, worldwide recorded music revenues in 2020, were about 21 and a half billion. And for two solid decades, that's been in a gradual decline. And we're just coming off six consecutive years of growth. And that growth is 100% due to creative artists like those who are joining us tonight. And streaming which has really driven a whole music, Renaissance or resurgence. And it's changed the whole model from you know, a few record labels that you had to bow down and appeal to, to this wide open Mecca, where everyone on the call is either a creator or a consumer, and everybody gets to decide whose music they like. And most of what I'm hearing on clubhouse I love So just to give you a few of the the high level points, and then I'm sure our musicians can speak to this. But physical music in the sense of you know, tape or cassette is not quite dead, there still are a few users. But as recently back as 2001, it was 100% of music. Then in 2001, Apple released the first iPod in 2003, they opened their iTunes Store, in 2008, Spotify launched in Europe, and in 2011, they launched in the US. And then in 2015, Apple debuted their Apple Music, so it's really very, very recently that it's opened up. And I love that you mentioned the clubhouse, the low the lullaby Club, which I would encourage everybody on this call to try if you haven't already, because it's my favorite way to go to sleep now. artists from all around the world play lullabies on different themes. And it's completely changed my personal Spotify List of artists, you might have heard of two artists that are on this call tonight. So I couldn't be more excited to hear from the musicians. And I thank you all for being part of that amazing reinvention and john, for bringing us together.
Great. And, you know, I do wonder, you know, does the musician win with all this technology and streaming? Or is the musician in in a tough spot. And you know, it'd be interesting to hear some of our artists talk about how they got into music and how their music careers are flourishing. You know, what are the highs? What are the what are the challenges, I'd like to turn to Terri, and also I want to thank a lot of musicians tonight you got on Comcast for the first time. Joining us tonight. Thank you for coming. So Terri, you're a legend at Berklee. Everyone wants to hang out with you and and learn from you. You do jazz and gender justice. And you were you've went Three Grammys, and you're just amazing. And I've heard you play the drums. I know you're a composer. How are you doing? How's your music life going? And, and you know what's on your mind these days?
Terri, you may be muted.
Does someone want to answer for Terri that that's a joke. So hey, James, welcome tonight. Can you go off mute? I know you joined clubhouse a few minutes ago.
How's it now? Can you hear me now?
I hear you perfectly.
I, john and Hi, everybody come? Very happy to be with all of you.
Yeah. So you're you're, you've conducted every major American and European Symphony Symphony Orchestra since you debuted with the New York Philharmonic in 1974. You've been the guest conductor at the Metropolitan Opera 270 times, and you're the music director for the LA opera since 2006. And you've conducted their I think, 400 performances. So you're, you're you're a busy guy. And then I know, you've been You and I were working on a very interesting project that I'd love for you to share about. But before you you talk about that, maybe, you know, what's what's the music world look like for you these days? And, and maybe tell the audience what it's like being a conductor and why they should want to be a conductor, why they should appreciate being a conductor?
Well, we've been through as you have been a very, very unique year. And we're just coming out of it. And we're all wondering where it's going. Although I think I see signs that people are dying for live performances to come back. And I certainly agree that the things we've discovered this year in terms of streaming in terms of zooming in terms of all the the the technical improvements, shall we say that we've had to make to keep alive and to keep communicating with our audiences are probably a lot of those are going to stay tuned, we're going to integrate them into classical music as well. And we're all hoping that that will be in addition to the resurgence of going back to live performances, because people seem to want a need to come together and be together as they listen to music. So what do I do? I mean, as you could tell that I made my debut in 1974 meats. I'm an old man now. But I'm proud of that. And like that, and I've been conducting for almost 50. Well, PS I have been conducting for 50 years. And so I've watched a lot of things developed come and go over all of those years. And it's a very exciting time to be a part of classical music. And now I know a lot of people think that we're all snobs. And we all are elitists. And I want to say I don't agree with any of that, like zero. Classical music is for everybody, just as every other form of music is for everybody. And things have changed a lot since I was a kid, I grew up going to the New York Public Schools. And in those days, we all got
musical education. And that includes classical music. And so we just took it for granted, it was another form of music. Now, okay, I was attracted to it and fell in love with it passionately and spent my life there having found my passion, but it is for everybody. And I think it's fallen out of the schools, which is a great pity, because everybody should be exposed after which then they can decide how much of a part of their lives they want to make it not everybody has to be a professional musician. Not everybody has to be a conductor. But it's nice to know what it's like to touch an instrument to make music on an instrument. It's nice to to know exactly what is the conductor do and what do we not do and what goes into making an orchestra play together? And what makes an opera an opera and why is that special? And why does that make so many people passionate about it? And so I think well those are all the important things to to accumulate to communicate. And this is a great time to do it because people have had to stay at home. People have had to be far away from each other and I think it's a great as there's not any hidden in that cloudy time there's a silver lining there. And I think we're finding it.
So James as a conductor, you come to work, sometimes in a great mood sometimes in a reflective mood. Does that have bearing on how you pull your orchestra together and how they may sound like are no two days, like, you know, for those who don't know much about what it means to conduct a, I'm curious for you to share on that on this and then then I want to get into the project that we've been working on.
Okay, well, that's very nice of you, john. So, you know, I'm not a morning person, I don't know how many of you all are, I would rather be night than morning. But morning comes every morning. And if you have to be in front of an orchestra at 10 o'clock, up until about 958, I'm wishing I was anywhere else. And I've taken drink as much coffee as I can to get myself going. And that's 958 and a 1001. I'm at full steam. Because the instant I start, music takes over my body, I don't even feel my body from that point on the concentration that goes into conducting an orchestra, the excitement of the music, the excitement of trying to inspire 90 people to
But I don't know.
Terri, it's an honor to be on here with you. Being a jazz person, I was actually just watching the International Jazz Day on PBS a week and a half ago or so. And you were featured on there. Yeah. Yeah, it was fantastic. I think it was the one that the United Nations, which was really amazing that they turn that into a concert but I don't know if there's a specific tune or anything
you want to request before we go to Haley.
Wow. Well, I know we mentioned will a week for me. Would you like to play that one?
Do I actually know that one? I think I actually know that.
Well then play whatever you feel.
Could be let's see what would be recently I haven't played jazz on here yet. JOHN are usually doing Star Wars or something else. Let's see.
You don't know Cory set the Guinness Book of World Record for playing his accordion 32 hours and 14 minutes. That's not what he's known for. But
I won't play that long here. Let's see do some kind of Terri
That was great. It was beautiful. I'm wondering how you got the drum sounds in there.
The the drums are alive. The thing is with recording you have the bass and then the bass chords and I can set different percussions to the bass and the bass chords but obviously with with jazz I have its velocity censored along with pulling the bellows so if I pull the bellows more, it's higher on the bass volume, but also it it goes by the velocity of the percussion and the bass which works well. Especially the dean Dean Dean getting anything You know, works well.
When you do your solo, do you have any, any accordion accompanying you?
I don't. But if I could figure that one out, I'll let you know.
Actually, before we go to Haley, like, What are you thinking when you're just in the groove? doing improv? Like, what what's going through your mind? And I'm sure it's personal for each musician, but jazz, you know, so much for jazz improv? What do you what do you reach to to be able to express yourself like that?
I mean, really, everything to me in all of music is the chord changes everything. And music to me is based on the chord changes, whether I'm listening to a pop tune jazz or classical doesn't matter. It's everything is coming from that. And especially an improv. It's that's, you know, where you're where you're going from, from that point. And how, um, you know, whatever you're thinking of, it's really based on where that's going.
And for those who don't know the the image of Cory that accordion on clubhouse, he actually designed that to try to make it look really cool, because he wanted to raise the profile of the accordion. Carrie, how about you on that question, you know, what's on your mind when you're doing improv?
Well, I don't have to worry about the chord change, percussive instrument. But for me, it's really about being in the moment. And it's the only place where I'm not thinking about anything else. So it's a very spiritual place for me, because I'm able to purely just be there and give all of myself and connect with, really with humanity. And that's kind of always my goal. And I remember going on stage once in Wayne Shorter saying, he let's play in a way tonight that if there's a woman that's in an abusive relationship, in the audience, that she has the courage to leave. And those are the things that I try to think about, you know, just connecting with people with things like courage and compassion, and all of those things. But I also feel like one note leads you to the next. So I'm happiest now in my 50s, playing free and open without worrying about, you know, this box that we've been in for so long, if you've, you know, played the standard repertoire. And that's, you know, I think is still great. And we always trying to figure out ways to be free, within the boundaries of whatever the pieces, but I'm at a place now, where I'd rather play without any boundaries.
Yeah, sure. Thank you for having me, john. Um, yes, I resonated with that very much. Terri. I started writing songs when I was about 11, and I really, really wanted to play them, but I was 11. So I couldn't go to bars and being from the North Shore near Boston, I just sort of found my way into this like, coffee house church basement New England folk scene. And so I was adopted very young into into that world and kind of mentored by a lot of folk artists and really embraced sort of that approach and and kind of the storyteller, troubadour type model, and that's really kind of fed my journey all the way through. Yeah, so I, these days I am. Well, COVID kind of stopped me in my tracks a bit but I was headed to to Germany for an artist's residency. In the city of of Dahal, there was a villa left to the city that an artist couple had bought and moved into in the 20s. Walter Vaughan rock the shell and Clary Vaughn rock the shell and they were artists and Daha was known as this kind of thriving arts community before the war and They ended up leaving the villa to the town and now the hall has a concentration camp there the memorial is there now if you didn't know that so that's kind of stained, stained the city's reputation.
And so now they have international artists come and live in this villa that is also a museum and kind of pour into the the creative atmosphere there and sort of bring back the life and the creativity in a place that has had a very traumatic history. So I'm planning for that I'll be there doing a creative project and kind of interviewing people in the in the town and writing folk songs and story songs. Kind of investigative journalists approach to songwriting as I call it. So that's next for me and I've been getting ready for that and trying to sort things out. And yeah, touring is on hold for now. So that's what I
Hayley, why don't you want you pick a song to play and tell us a little bit about the the creation of it and what you hope people take away from it.
All right, sure. I will do. I'll play you a real a real story song. This is I put out an EP in 2019 called where I know you that was a collection of story songs of of other people's stories that I felt sort of a privilege and an almost responsibility to get to share. And this is one of those I wrote it for.
him to Santa Barbara. She is just 19 some money from her father, a man she loves but never see three but she's tired.
So she lives out of school barns parked in some old lady's yard. To this day she'll thank the 70s in California star. She's still got lonely and the boy can give it there. She's
blonde, then the bleacher three freedom never occur. See? never occur. Free. Just ask Bethany.
Boy with the guitar became Uber and he left your move baby. shows the road over family. Bethany she left there
for a farmer
out in the country raised a little girl at wild horses and Daisy Laura's demo record blonde and ugly to three.
Freedom never
ever just
Bethany
Wow, that was that was great, Haley, thank you for for playing.
So how do you get your inspiration for your folk songs? I mean, I've listened to a number of your songs, number of your albums, like where does it come from?
Um,
I mean often from I mean, like that song like real people in my life. Originally it was all about my experiences, but but now I'm sort of very interested in other people's experiences and sort of shining light on the moments in people's lives that to them just seem banal or mundane, but to me are like, Oh my God, that's it. That's a life happening, like building that song. The way that I approached my whole career so far have been so fruitful in terms of like feeding my creativity, because I, I tour in this very DIY, humble way, and I stay in people's houses, and I play for small listening rooms, sometimes in people's living rooms all over the world. And I kind of get these glimpses into all these different lives and all these different places. And that has made my my songwriting life so rich, because it's, it's not just about me anymore. It's sort of like weaving, weaving together all these little glimpses of sort of experience that kind of inhabit and then move on from so. So I guess from everything from, you know, observations.
So I know you were in Nashville for a little bit going to school. And I'm wondering, how did that setting shape you or influenced you? And I know you're you're working on something with someone from Spain? Yeah, what's what's next? I know, Max is going between Sweden and Spain, there may be a connection there if you need a jazz pianist with with that record, and then maybe play one more piece, and then we'll do a question and then, and then Alex is gonna going to be up next. Yes. Okay. Yes, I know, Max, I need to link up with you. I'm trying to get trying to get to Barcelona this summer to make a record with some amazing musicians there. And you would be an incredible addition to that crew. If you're around. Please do. Yeah. Yes. Okay. All right. Yeah, no worries. Okay, awesome. Um, yeah, Nashville, I went to school. Initially, I didn't finish college there. But I initially went to Belmont University in Nashville out of high school.
And then I was at Beaumont for a couple years. And then I stayed in Nashville after that for another, almost two years. And it was really, really good for me, I learned a lot. And I kind of was sort of writing in the Nashville songwriting scene for a while, which has a very particular, you know, structured way to it, which was really good for me because I kind of had to, to learn to write in a sort of on demand way, which I don't know how much I use that now. You know, it didn't necessarily bring out sort of, it didn't free you know, the creative spirit in me, I felt a little bit constricted there. But I did learn a lot. But it's very much like, you know, show up at 11am and write a song with a stranger.
Which there's a place for that, but, but I ended up leaving there and moving home and then a whole bunch of opportunities opened up in Europe, and I was touring kind of nonstop over there. And my soul just felt so much freer and more kind of in my purpose. So so I don't know that I'll move back to Nashville, but I have amazing friends there. And it really was an important like, step in my in my journey and sort of finding my way as a songwriter. So
great. So Hayley, why don't you play another piece? And tell us about it? And then Alex, you're up next. Okay, sure.
This is uh, this is the title track of the of an EP I'm putting out next month. I think everything's all over the place. But um, yeah, it's, it's called after you but the EP is titled after a line in this song that says I'm grieving 100 little lives for every season. The EP is called 100 little lives. And I wrote that line long before 2020 but it has all the more all the more meaning now, as we grieve not only literal lives, but you know, parts of ourselves and everything that we've lost and gained and lost and gained again over the past year, so So this is called after you.
So
this is called after you.
Hi tree, tree. Play then I will walk in For the lie but then I lost try and bring the right thing see?
I see now is a wastin to build myself a castle just to climb rifle through the fragments of my
3d little bottles in one way oh my goodness too I know I am a kid
floating on the cloud here and I can see the mood or wish the fog clears the stars are burning we just looked away angry
you have barcia me Did I don't know I tried I could not find the chain
3d little bar in one way. Oh my god I do too. I am again. Nothing much has changed except some binding revelations I am holding out my and fickle are quite patients
have to leave
after you.
Great. Thanks, Haley. And if you don't if you want more of Haley's on the shows off in next week. I know. We're gonna have Carlos Cashman who is company in the history of the planets the fastest to get to a billion dollar valuation. And he i think is gonna be the 10th billionaire to come out of MIT. He creates, he buys companies for a million to $100 million and, and sells their product under a white label through the Amazon network. And we're going to learn a lot about Petey in Tulsa, Oklahoma. And he is has started like 20 different companies. So he's a serial entrepreneur. And we have Norman dygraf, who is the Chief Marketing Officer of a fortune five company, CBS. I mean, you know, I think when he got there, it was like a fortune 15 company and winning.
JOHN, we lost you there for a second.
Did you hear any of what I said?
A second, just like 10 seconds was lost.
Okay, so next week, we're gonna have Norman degrom, the CMO of CVS health, and he made the decision with his team to stop selling tobacco and, and they bought Aetna. And it's a fortune five company. It'll be interesting to hear from him. And Carlos Cashman. And I think Haley is in Korea played the most on our shows to date. So next, I want to call up Alex and I'm also excited to point out that our next four musicians all have their instrument with them. So we'll be hearing a lot of music tonight and an hour In this case, it's his ability to sing. But Alex, what's on your mind? How's the opera world? How did you get into opera? What do you think of opera? What do you love about opera? What do you hate about opera? Just, you know, tell us, tell us about opera.
I, first of all, thank you for having me, john, and thank you for asking me to speak. It's an honor to be here. It's really cool to be in a room with my stroke, Conlin and amazing musicians like Corey and Terry and Haley.
I,
I found opera by accident, I was 17 years old. And I was very lucky growing up in California that I went to a public high school that had an extremely well funded arts program. And I was asked by one of the vocal coaches in that program, if I wanted $100, to sing in the chorus of Don Giovanni, at a small opera company company that unfortunately doesn't exist in San Francisco anymore. And I was 17 years old, and I I wanted to be a performer and they had me at $100. So I joined that production and sang in the chorus and met the person who was my first real voice teacher who showed me that I had this voice that I didn't realize that I had. And the deeper and deeper I got into the art form, the more I loved it, because I personally am not a subtle person at all. And the thing that I love most about opera is the lack of subtlety. There is an incredible quote by an opera director named Casper Holton, and he says an opera we spend time on what matters in life, the big emotional peaks and abysus. opera is the world's first multimedia. And through the combination of music and theater, we can identify with characters, but then when they feel love, despair, loneliness, fear, hope, jealousy, stop time and explore those moments further through music and movement, finding a language for the emotions that can be difficult to talk about the great contradiction, and that is over the course of the last year, it's been very difficult for me to listen to opera or to sing just in the fact that we've, you know, singers and performers have been forced to step out of the lives that we were in prior to COVID. And seeing the streaming revolution in the opera world is amazing, because I've spent the last few years developing screenplays for feature like films of operas and writing a children's show. Specifically based on opera, my work in New York City when I'm not singing, I teach chess to three, four and five year olds. And the way in which I teach chess to young children is by telling them stories. And the only music making I've been doing during COVID really is I have much like Ricard Wagner wrote in leitmotifs, for all of the characters in his ring cycle, I have given little light motifs to every one of the pieces on the chessboard, who are also characters in the stories that I tell. So for example, the pawns for those of you who play chess pawns can only move one step they can move two steps when they make their very first move of the game. And my little ulterior motive to get kids to not only learn how the pawns moves, but also become opera fan, sorry, my dog is freaking out in the background, is I rewrote the words to the anvil chorus from your throat fatale by Giuseppe Verdi. So I rewrote it into
We are the ponds and we move one step at a time and john, just like decaying, we move one step at a time, not three, no, only one step forward.
Because I personally think that the way in which that we can assure an evolution of opera in the 21st century is by appealing to younger and younger audiences and giving smaller younger children an opportunity to experience what unamplified voices and the way in which we can process those big emotions in life that we're going to deal with throughout our entire life, in opera and in music. And I think in 2021 it's been really interesting getting these streaming concerts in bite sized versions of opera in order to keep the tradition alive and keep music in the ears of our audiences. It's been, it has been a challenge. I mean, I personally have been going through an identity crisis in the last year of I am an opera singer, but I don't have anywhere to sing. And I'm so happy now that everything is in the process of reopening, because we can go back to telling these stories. And it it does seem like there is a true movement within the opera world to change the parts of the industry that have made it more difficult for stories to be told, and for people to be exposed to this incredible art form.
Alex, two things. One, I wonder, maybe you could talk a little bit about what it's like to perform opera given how, how much you, you know, opera singers, I think really get into the part like, What is it? What is it like physically and maybe it's different person to person? And then it was Mother's Day this weekend? Your mom's in the room? Do you want to dedicate a song to her? I know, I know. I didn't ask you ahead of time. And but yeah, so those. Those are my two questions.
I'm sorry, Joe. It was the first question again.
What's it like to perform? Right, right, right, right, physically like it seems like you guys work hard.
Yeah, I would say that. Opera and Ballet are the two closest things that you can get in the performing arts world to the Olympics. Your entire body is put to use literally from head to toe when you sing and singing with a full orchestra when your voice is unamplified is honestly what I think it feels like to be God. It is the most incredible feeling in the world because it's it's there is this unbelievable synthesis like mine mind meld between you, the conductor, the other singers that you're singing with on stage. And it's different whether you're singing in a chorus in an opera or if you're a soloist in an opera. My favorite opera that I've ever performed in and that I listened to on a regular basis is a cowboy opera, written by Giacomo Puccini, who is arguably the most famous of all of the opera composers called left on Chula del West. It's set in the gold rush in California during the gold rush in California. And the main character's name is dick. And I've had the opportunity to both sing a role in that opera and singing the chorus. And singing in the chorus of that opera is one of his probably the most fun I've ever had on stage in my entire life. And when you're singing as a soloist, it's definitely there's more focus that goes into it. Because you have to keep yourself in a very free but vulnerable headspace to be able to accurately portray the character and show the vulnerable parts of yourself that you need to access in order to sing well. The body can only do so much the body is the vessel through which the sound comes. And the mind and our imagination is where we originate that sound. If you know it's I constantly am asking myself the abundance question when I'm practicing, which is if it was already perfect, and I had unlimited resources, what would it sound like? What would it look like? What would it feel like? The I'll tell one quick, funny story. One of the most random
But it was pretty damn cool. When I when I sang the first high note and 40,000 people started screaming and cheering for me and I was like, Okay, all right. This is fun, and we could relax a little bit and let it rip. But it is a really incredible feeling and I can't wait for the first opportunity to sing in a big large room with a big audience and an orchestra. Alex Do you want to dedicate something to your mom here? clubhouse. And we're like I said, we're recording this and
we can make that into an audiogram that you could send your mom for Mother's Day next year. Just don't tell her that it was from this year. It'll be a surprise. JOHN, I
Can ask Alex a question?
Yeah, no. canol who is probably one of the people with the most highest emotional intelligence I've ever met. And here we're hearing from an opera singer. And we have the head of the LA Philharmonic artists director. We were got Opera in the house. Yeah, I can. Oh, you
Alex, I love what you just said. In fact, all this while I was in my heart, hoping I could ask you about Nessun Dorma. You know, the Indian subcontinent is suffering and burning here a noun very least, you know, the COVID-19 crisis is burning us up. And I think last year was Italy. Unfortunately, there was burning the same way. If you remember. I feel like that was the song that you know, the opera singer sang outside the windows of people. And it gave them this ray of hope. You know, and I feel like just listening to you, right? I can feel the energy of how you're so devoted to your craft and your, you know, your attributes as a as a renaissance man is you put in modern resonance sounds, man, but more so as an opera singer. And I love how you've elucidated what you are and who you are, why you do what you do. I would be really honored to listen to NASA Nessun Dorma, maybe not now but whenever you're comfortable, you know, for you to play that and we'll have a hopefully not a 40,000 people audience only I don't think clubhouse audience a significant audience
could all I would love to sing that for you. But I I think I am far too out of shape to put that in my throat at the moment. But I will I will get it back in shape for you. And I'll sing it on another one of these clubhouse tonight. I
love it. Let's do it. That's what Perfect.
Perfect. I would like to make one very quick offering. Another thing from the another piece of music that I adapted for my chess curriculum was what I like to call the breakfast lunchtime and dinner live yamo one of the characters in our chess curriculum is named King chompers. He loves food more than anything else. And he has a chef named chef squishy feet who will make him 10 pancakes for breakfast 20 sandwiches for lunch and 30 pizzas for dinner every single day. And I wrote a very, very, very silly rewriting of Giuseppe verbis live yamo which let me find the lyrics real quick. And this is king chompers and Chef squishy feet arguing over what to eat for breakfast.
Good morning. Good morning, Chef squishy. It's time for me to eat breakfast, King. shucking fish. Would you like me to make you for breakfast today? shed squishy feet. I would like pancakes. Can you finish? I'd love to make your pancakes. Would you like one pancake or two to eat for breakfast today? No, not one pancake. Not two. But pancakes for me. Squishy feet, please. Thank you.
So, Mimi, I hope you you like that. Alex, that was awesome. Now I want to turn to max who's in? Are you in Sweden or Spain? I can't remember.
Sweden.
Yep. So I want to hear from you. Pete. How you doing? Are you still here? Yeah, I think pizza Yeah. Peter. Peter here. Pete's brothers, a buddy of mine. He's part of the leadership of TripAdvisor in Pete. Yeah. You hear Pete? Yeah. Hey, john. Yeah, I can't wait to hear from you. And after the shooting in Florida, you did work with a bunch of students from there.
Yes. Is actually and thanks for having me, john. It's your honor to be with everybody here is actually about six or seven weeks after after the shooting that happened there. And we were working. We were invited to work down at the actual school at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. And we brought down you know, brought down my laptop and an interface and brought on a very A small setup for recording. And I remember, like, we saw that we saw the, the high school from the highway, and had seen all the pictures on TV. And you know, see it up close was, you know, it was definitely a moment. And then as we're approaching the school, we're going by the athletic fields, and it's dozens and dozens of banners from all over the world all over the country, sending support, you know, to the community and to the kids there. So that was you just really felt everything that was, you know, that we were walking into. So we get to the school, and I was doing this project with my wife, land gardener. And so we walk in, and we're in an auditorium at the school, and it's an incredibly stylish silence, and heavy, heavy space. And the kids are sitting there and just waiting. And it was run by a, an organization called MSD. Shine was a nonprofit organization that was started by the parents. And we were brought in with along with some other creative arts therapists and music therapists. So it was all different modalities. But they recognize that how powerful the arts could be in in handling trauma and addressing trauma. And so, you know, we are our role was to, we worked with seven students, high school students that witnessed and certain, you know, physically survived the incident. And we took them through a sensory songwriting process, which was, you know, working with hand drums and, and small percussion instruments, and really talking about emotions that they were feeling and what would that sound like and creating a space that was a first of all safe to express and you know, and to be able to explore them. Meanwhile, the the football team was practicing, and they were lifting weights, and sometimes the weights would drop outside, and the kids would literally jump out of their out of their seats. So it was, you know, it was just eggshells throughout throughout most of the experience. But what we saw in a lot of the kids hadn't had much music experience, one or two of the kids were involved in music, previous and, but what we were trying to do was to really get them to open up into into feel what it is that they were feeling, because a lot of what was going on was that they were being told, you know, you're okay, you're gonna be okay, that's gonna be all right. And, you know, one of the main lyrics of the songs they wrote is tell me I'm not okay. And what they were really wanting to express was, you know, what happened, you know, is indescribable, but we're gonna describe how we feel, and what we're trying to do with it. And, you know, the song was called Hear me out. And, you know, as we know, this, we worked with them over the course of four days. And they're really was a, you know, a lot of silence, a lot of fear, a lot of tension. But as we went, and as they started to hear the song start coming together, and, and the lyrics and the emotion come out. And, you know, we're playing back the song as we go, and we're recording it, you know, when playing back raw tracks for them, and everybody had a hand in it, everybody played in this man, the whole drum track was, you know, hand percussion, and, but we made it sound pretty big, actually, you know, I think, Terri, you'd be, you'd be pretty psyched on that drum track that we put together with the kids. And at the end of the program, you know, we everybody gathered all the different modalities of art, visual arts, movement, theater, and all these pieces. And they played the, you know, a very rough balance of, of what, you know, what we put together. And we're back on that stage, which was silent, you know, three, four days prior. And we play the song. And they literally picked themselves up with seven students, they pick themselves up, you know, some of them were sitting down and pick themselves up and put their arms around each other, and stood up and played the song for everybody. And there was a, there was a silent break in the song that represented the 17 lives that that were lost. And it just, you know, it just hit everybody in the room. And what, you know, they spoke about the experience of writing and so, you know, so all this is to say, I guess, is that, you know, I've heard some of the other musicians speak about this is that, yes, you know, music does heal. And it doesn't necessarily solve, you know, the issues that we face, but it helps us connect, it helps us uncover, it helps us discover, you know, what it is that we're feeling and using music, for lyrics or for composition, or for instrumental, or obviously, combining all of those pieces, it puts, it puts the writer and the listener in a different place. And we all know that. And so it sort of gives people and particularly young people or anybody, it gives you a little bit of a push, right, and it gives you a support that you might not otherwise have. And so I think that, you know, it just was an experience. And I've been doing this work for like 18 years prior to that it just was obviously the most urgent experience I've ever had. And to see the immediate impact. It was it was it just, it just, you know, music did its thing and the opportunity to express and for the kids to be given a platform to write and to record and then to have that be shared. I mean, you know, so often kids are told what to do what to think this was the opposite. This was like this is what's up with us. And you know, have a listen. Did I lose you guys?
No, no, we're here. Okay. So Peter, you pushing play on something?
Oh, um,
you should have a listen. Like
I was sorry. I was just saying like I would say from the perspective of the of those kids.
Yeah, no, no real stuff. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, when you when you organize that and that'll be something we drop in a little later. But Pete you know, music therapy helping helping people to feel whole it's it's such a special. I want to turn to max and I see Ross has joined Ross is a legend in a lot of spheres. And one of those is Allison is absolutely a huge fan of Ross, what you do. So thanks for coming. I think you're doing a masterclass or something before and I let people know. So any before I go to Max, does anyone want to just play back what they heard pizza up to or, or have a question or any observation. I think Pete is a special soul. He's been doing music for years. And while he's quite a talented musician, he's decided to use music as a vehicle to inspire youth and help help people who've gone through tough times and trauma and, and so on. So before I go to Max, anyone want to comment?
I do want to comment, actually. Pete, very, really inspirational. I actually went to I lived in South Florida for six years. I went to Dillard Center for the Arts. in Fort Lauderdale. Close ish to Marjory Stoneman Douglas. And I remember going to Marjory Stoneman Douglas to do some performances with the band from Taylor the jazz band. So yeah, I just wanted to throw that out there.
Yeah, yeah. When What year did you graduate from them?
I was there 20 2012 to 2014. Just a couple years in high school.
So Max has had a real interesting life. He had seven blood transfusions one day and he thinks that may have turned him into a jazz pianist. Maybe you know, you could explain that. You I think you're working with someone from the voice on on on on something you're very talented musician. You got the I think the one of the most sought after merit scholarships to go to Berkeley full full ride. And you're you're just an amazing performer. But maybe maybe tell us a little bit about your journey and music and and why you think those blood transfusions made you into a jazz musician and and maybe before you ask answer that, maybe play a little bit to kind of establish yourself and hang with some of these other grades that are on on the show.
Sure thing, okay, so this is a piece called straightening D
So Max, yeah. Tell us about yourself. Tell us about your journey with music and what's on your mind. And it's amazing. You're in. You know, you're in Europe now and the music is crystal clear.
Right? So, yeah, I let Yeah, let me just start off. I just want to backtrack a bit about on what you said john, opening impro without me. Um, so yeah, I did. I had seven blood transfusions. So what john was referring to is at age 13, I'm 24 years old now. Age 13. I had a near death experience that where I collapsed on the floor, I had converged huge chunks of coagulated blood. And I was rushed to the hospital and they found 20 ulcers in my stomach, and I had lost half of my blood. I did a TED talk about this experience. JOHN, it was very gracious enough to offer me a chance to speak about this through TEDx beacon Street. Anyways, so the, the whole experience of that was very traumatic. So okay, so I lost half my blood and I had to get seven blood transfusions. And each of those transfusions came from a different stranger, I don't know who, but I believe that, you know, a lot of that blood, maybe could have contributed to my drive to play music in some way. And so, so that's the story about that. And my I recently graduated from Berklee College of Music as a Presidential Scholar, which is the top scholarship you can get at Berkeley, everything is covered. room and board. Everything tuition. I, my newest release is with Olivia Kay, who was a vocalist on season four, the voice, and we have a new track out called New World. What I'm thinking about today. You know, I really, it's been so, so great to hear from the people who've been speaking today from you know, Terri and James. It's really, oh, what a time where I, you know, we're living history right now. And I feel like there's a, there's really a need to create an environment that feels empowering for young artists, especially right now. There's a lot of fear, not just because of the pandemic, but because of so many crazy things that have happened on our world over the last 20 years. Starting with 911, in 2001, the Great Recession from 2007, to 2009. The me to movement conflicts with the police that led to Black Lives Matter, and so many more, leading to 2020 in the pandemic. So everything kind of feels very unstable and scary. I know talented musicians. And friends of mine, they've taken jobs at Amazon warehouses, where the pressure is really, really intense. And there's nothing left at the end of the day to give to music. And yet, there's so many opportunities to make money doing music than there were ever before. You know, in my case, for example, I'm focused on composing and producing as much music as possible, and monetizing it. Maybe you may think that $20 per month from one stream of one track isn't much. But if I wrote 1000 tracks, which is about three tunes per day, that's $20,000 a year passive income. And if, you know if you keep composing and submitting tunes for sync licensing placement, that is for film, TV, advertising, etc, practically in every country, eventually, you know, the tunes will start to get placed and you can earn more. And that and of course, that's not a magic spell that requires work, as does everything but I feel bad for my fellow Berkeley graduates because, you know, they finish school and they have no idea what they want to do next. And you know, then they ultimately they feel they have to take a regular job, maybe. Um, so, in general, there's a lot. But what I've been thinking about a lot is that there's a lot of focus, especially in music school, you know, for the young, these young artists like myself and my peers for coming up. When they're in school, there's a lot of focus on certain music related classes, which is important, but not enough on making the connections that will provide work in the real world. And one of the, the best examples, or not best, but one of the examples that I can see is that in the tech fields, for example, people who can be in school and they can already be making money, I had a friend who was a freshman at MIT, he spent summers working at Google, making $10,000 a month, maybe that's not possible outside of tech, but even $1,000 per month to promising musicians shouldn't be impossible. So the point here is that there's no real funding or network to achieve this. What I see is that there's a lot of old ways of doing things in the music business. And it's entrenched, like a huge boulder. And it feels like if you're not already in the club, so to speak, it will take forever to carve out a little hole, and bargin unless you're already connected. So I'm taking a page from the tech world. I think that's why we need more disruption in the music business. It still seems like an unachievable goal for most musicians, and certainly for the parents who don't see the point of investing the cost of a house for music education, because it still seems practical. So I really think that we need funding for musicians, lots of them who are very promising, you know, to very talented musicians, and to get practical experience in the real world. Whether that means funding music for for music for independent films, commercials or more festivals or whatever.
Hey, Matt Max, as a 24 year old you you've lived a few lifetimes, this is very thoughtful. I'd love to hear from the other musicians. You know, what do you think of what Max is saying I was in Asbury Park. Not too long ago, I was at the stone pony where Bruce Springsteen played. And I wonder if in today's environment, a Bruce Springsteen would even be able to come up and get discovered. You know, there may be some good ways that musics getting distributed, but also some challenging ways if the economic model isn't working. And then after after people comment, I'd love to have max Have you played one more piece and then we're going to go to Alison to welcome Ross. Ross. I think it's done some really special work on clubhouse and and I'm looking forward to Alison welcoming Ross. And then we're gonna go to Corey. Who is the Michael Jordan, LeBron James Tom Brady of the accordion. And then we're gonna go to Carolyn who has a 1675 violin that she is a foenum. With that and looking forward to hearing from her and then we'll come back to Pete but musicians you know, anyone want to comment on what Max is saying. And Alex? I feel like you were saying some similar things. Or not touching on something.
Max, you nailed it.
Oh, no. What happened?
You nailed it so well that he felt it was time to wrap up?
No.
He'll he'll come back. Is someone else want to comment or build on what Max said?
Um, hi.
This is Leo on max. Such a pleasure to see you here. I couldn't recognize your current picture. Max was one of my students at Berkeley. And one of my ensembles wonderful pianos.
Yeah.
Yeah, man, what
a surprise to see you here and great to hear speaking. And, and well, I didn't know that part of your that the story of your life about the, you know, all the older medical stuff that you went through young better. I don't know if that that was the reason but you're a great, great pianist, and very, very, very glad to see you here and thriving.
Thank you. I'm glad to see you too. Leo Blanco is the teacher and mentor to me from Berkeley. So shout out to him.
I'd like to I'd like to comment, but I'm not a musician. I I come from the music world. I don't use the word business with music. Because unfortunately, I don't think they are actually connected. Max, I think you're absolutely right about that. There are people that work in the business and trying to create business around it. And that's powerful. I'd be happy to introduce anybody on this call to some of the people that look at it from the perspective as you described it. For years, I had sessions in my living room specifically for sync license opportunities and television placement, things like that. I know, Cory from Los Angeles, but and one of the things that I was thinking about is that, in many ways, is a great time to be a musician, because you can have a career in a way that wasn't possible before, because that track was very limited to live performances, radio, ventually, video, things like that. So now, you have this opportunity. But that doesn't make it necessarily any easier, especially from the perspective of what you were talking about. I think these platforms that have tried to re numerate and really create a place for creators to get paid is super important to support and support as many of them as you can just like, you wouldn't necessarily want to have your music only on one in one record store or play one gig. There are people like Mark Geiger, who was one of the top talent agents in music forever, who is now on a mission to save as many clubs as possible. And that brings me to my thoughts about clubhouse and whether or not I mean, Haley, I discovered you here. I told my friend Wayne price at room tone to try to find you so you could be on on that. And I just wonder an orca boy, I fell madly in love with you the other day with canals event I'd never heard you before. And I know you have I think another another jobs. I'm not sure which one is your side hustle. But I think they're both probably really powerful and important. So I just wonder, have you found any way to try to really kind of utilize the power of things like clubhouse, which is a different kind of network. But as its audio driven, is powerful for music, I think they're upgrading of their sound and whether you've been able to make inroads in talking to some of the people at clubhouse, many of whom are big supporters of music from their backgrounds. I just wondered if that was something that could be that you could share about anybody has anything about that. And I personally as an artist development person for 30 years at record companies, and I made 1000s and 1000s of music videos, for many artists that you know, have, like, etc, etc. I'm happy to help if anybody wants to DM me and strategize this because I couldn't agree more with how important it is and how difficult that is. But we'll see some things.
Now Liz, well, well put in an imagination action, we record all these shows, and we put them up. And for every theme, you know, whether it's space for the brain or longevity, we have musicians play interstitials. And we want to compile those pieces and help raise awareness. So that's a small thing that we're trying to do. And one of these musicians or people who've raised their hand to kind of help celebrate the imagination action topics, and and they're certainly worthy of that. But I think you're totally right. And I think our next speakers, Ross has been, you know, may have some insight into how he's been using the platform. Does any before we hear max play out, does anyone else want to comment on, on what Max said?
I accidentally left the meeting. When did you guys lose me and my rants?
Just before you started?
Oh, no. Well, I went on to say that in the opera world in particular is having a major issue in terms of the wages that we are paid at young artists programs, which are the gateway to career at large opera houses around the world. And the issue that opera is maybe the only profession in the world where we have to pay for our job interview. Every fall audition season comes around. And let me tell you look up Zach Finkelstein, the middle class artist, he wrote an article about audition fees in the opera world. So we have to do pre screening every year for these major young artists programs where we have to spend lots and lots of money to make professional recordings, and send those professional recordings along with a check to basically every opera company in the country. And the application fees can range anywhere from $20 to hundreds. And that is just for the potential opportunity for them to hear us live in the room. And opera is having a major problem right now where a lot of the voices that we're seeing make it to the you know, larger stages of the world. They're doing it because they have the financial backing of either their parents, or a patron of some kind. Personally in 2017 and 18, I could not afford trying to survive in New York City and also put aside like nearly 15 $100 just to apply to these programs. That's not even some of them. you incur extra fees to audition. You have to pay pianists to play your audition for you. If you're not living in New York City, you have to pay the travel expenses of getting to New York City, your hundreds of dollars and our voice lessons and coachings. You know, it's it's a major issue that we're facing.
Yeah. Great. Well, I think, you know, set a lot to think about here and you know, this is a safe room to kind of talk about some of that stuff. Max. Before we go to Ross. Do you want to play a piece and do you want to dedicate it to someone or something?
Sure thing. This is a piece called Bossa in de and I was just playing around with bossa nova styles inspired by a great Brazilian composers like Antonio Carlos Jobim. And I hope you enjoy bossa nova and D, here we go.
Great.
Thank you, Max. It's so nice to have 20 somethings share their view in the world, and to hear their music. Next, Allison, looking forward to introducing our next musician. I also want to point out that Kelly stachel, who's a close friend has is formally joining clubhouse on May 17. And she's gonna have a big role in helping for the future strategy of clubhouse. And she's very aware of the show. And she's she's dropped in a few of the shows the last few weeks. And as we talk about imagination, action, and what what our ambitions are, we have about 200 speakers listed on our site. If you go to imagination inaction club, you can see them and we're going to be curating different themes every week and till eternity. And we want to be a really special force on clubhouse and music is going to be always key part of it. And maybe we'll do a few shows like this. But Allison Yeah. Tell us about Ross and welcome, Rob.
Wow, well, first of all, Ross, this may get a little personal because we've never really met. But I just want to say first of all, thanks to all the unbelievable musical talent that we've already heard on this evening. It's just it's really I bow down to all the different types of modalities and all the way that music kind of touches our heart, but just
Actually Liz may not even realize that James, who's in Rome right now, is the head of the Philharmonic in LA like he's conducted 400 orchestras, right in your town of LA. Yeah, Alison, back to you. Sorry about that.
I think most people do know him even even those of us in Boston. But so so first of all, next to this amazing room, and this time with john and each of you is done. And everyone who's been listening knows clubhouse lullaby has become my personal favorite. It's so creative. It's the most amazing way to go to sleep each night. It's on six, maybe seven nights a week, and it's just run off of the most amazing musical talent. But I also mentioned at the beginning of the show Ross just to fill you in because I know you joined us around seven is that I my day job is like track club. trends for a leading consulting firm. And I've been reading all about this like creator, passion economy, and I thought, Oh my God, this sounds really cool. It's the fastest growing type of new business. There's 50 million people around the world who consider themselves creators, and I disciplined reading about it, but I never really understood it until clubhouse lullaby. And what that did for me was really you guys single handedly changed my personal Spotify list from groups that everybody would have heard of, you know, Ed Sheeran and his best friends. on now to just a whole bunch of clubhouse musicians and I just listened to your music all the time. I love Mohsen, who projects from vertical apartment building in Toronto, and Talia, we all get our favorites. So I'd love to turn it over to you because I know that you're a moderator on clubhouse lullaby is songwriter, a musician from New Jersey. But maybe you could just tell this audience a little bit more about the Lola bears and clubhouse lullaby world? And then of course, we'd love to have you play for us.
Absolutely. Well, thank you for that very, very kind introduction. Yeah. So lullaby club was started by Axel mandsaur. And it is seven nights a week, which is crazy at 9pm. Pacific, except for the Friday nights when we do an open mic, and that's at 6pm. Pacific. And what it is, is an artist showcase and an opportunity to kind of unwind and sing softly and give each other a little bit of spite from all of the chaos that exists in the world. And honestly, a lot of chaos that exists on this clubhouse app. I don't frequent too many too many rooms. But there's a lot of rooms that people are just yelling at each other. And there's a lot of yelling outside. So I think it it became very necessary and enjoyed during the pandemic, when, or at least the height of the pandemic over the winter, when everything was really really closed, especially in places that got cold. To have people in your, in your ears that weren't asking anything of you besides to fall asleep, or to enjoy really great musicians. And there have been some incredible, incredible musicians that have been on it. I was playing a different room, actually, when Axl popped in with a friend of his name, Nico Frank, who's also been all over the lullaby club. And I'd met him through an artist named Lucy Clearwater, who is another host of the lullaby club. And I have a very kind of like hushed folky voice. So I think Axl thought it was great for the room. And I started playing a few nights here and there, and I saw an opportunity to jump in as a host. And it is honestly been a saving grace for me as an artist. Because here in New Jersey, in New York, there's been no venues open, and really no outdoor spaces, it's still, you know, 45 here at night. So there's very limited places to play. And in the world of streaming and Spotify and algorithms and this and that, it's kind of difficult for me as like a very deeply lyrical songwriter to cut my music into tic talkable chunks, or less than 52nd, algorithmic pleasing ID posts or anything like that. So to be able to really like mesh with people and connect and play full songs and have this kind of audience there has been such as such a joy, and it's really been also a joy hearing what it means to other people. Some people use it, you know, some people have had messaged me that they have autistic children that really liked the music to go to sleep. Some people have have PTSD from various things that have happened in their life that say, it gives them a chance to relax and kind of know that the volumes never going to kick higher than a certain level. So you know, there's just a kind of a myriad of reasons why it's been super beneficial for, for me and for a ton of people out there. So, so, so happy that you've had that experience with it, Allison, and have enjoyed the the nights that have been at the helm.
Can I just add one little vignette before you play us a wonderful serenade Ross. So just to give people a sense of the kind of creativity, which we've also heard from the artists all this evening, you know, one of the things is you have these challenge rounds on the local bike club. And one of the ones I remember is when I think this was when you were moderating, but people had to go to Trulia, pick out a real estate ad and then create a song around that real estate ad. Yeah, it was just sort of like for so many people to be laughing about, you know, the sort of facade and the two parking garage and all the features. It was just kind of amazing. So Anyway,
yeah, yeah, and
I'm right outside in New York. So the New York City apartments are just such a facade. They're just like, hey, this one and I think I remember I was just like two front facing windows. I was like my chorus of the song, because that's like a big deal in New York if you have a window, so for like, $2,000 a month. So that was the wonderful Ashley my eight is idea to sing a Zillow listing, there's there's four rounds where you we open up with an original recover, we do a wild card round, which is generally a challenge. Like that one, there's a request round where you can go to the lullaby club, Instagram and put a request. And then there's the talking round, where you play a really soothing final piece. So I will briefly mention that I have an EP coming out on Thursday of this week and my first music video, this song will not be on it, but it will be on a forthcoming record that I'll hopefully be putting out in the fall. So if you like it following me on Spotify is just so so beneficial to all those crazy algorithms. And Allison I will say that my Spotify is the same way I used to be listened to a lot of major label acts and now I've found so much joy listening to people that I've connected with in Hayley and Max, that's no exception to you both Hayley I'm enamored by your voice and max your playing is absolutely beautiful. So let me just let me play the song called Gracie and then we can pick up from there but honored to be here and thank you so much.
There is beauty then there's grace. So what I'm seeing in the very same place, beauty hangs in the scale by grace he trips with the mind in the Star Wars. Grave sutras with the mind in the star but their sacred is home a che on arrive by just saying her name the beauty show cast spell. Gracie sings like a clear jab. Gracie sings like a clear chapel bell. She has a gospel. Truth. There is beauty then there's grace. When I was young, I saw that unsane beauty lies about grace she's plan in her birthday. Grace his plan and her she cut him a gospel. True. Gray see. beauties in the mind. eyes are on you. beauties in the Ukraine.
Wow, Ross. I just have to say I'm amazed if anyone on our platform is still awake, but it's hard to a nicer way to go to sleep tonight. But maybe one question And I would have and then maybe others have questions for you. How easy has it been to organize what you're doing on clubhouse? Like do you feel clubhouse lullaby couldn't have happened without clubhouse? And, you know, what are the challenges? Like you get troll showing up? Or do you get loud people like it? You guys make it look easy, but I think you told us one day it takes like six hours of work a day, and
oh, well, yeah, well, so there's, um, there's a ton of us there's, there's a in the school group chat we have, how many is that? Is there a computer notification that kept going off, but um, I've haven't been able to figure out what that there's, like 13 or 14 in the group chat. And that means that there's some of us that are handling social, there's some of us that are handling the artists outreach, there are people that are stage mods every night that do sound checks beforehand to get everyone sound on the correct level. So no one is being kind of intrusively loud, or people don't have to change their volumes all the time. So clubhouse is phenomenal, and that it's given us an opportunity and a platform to do these crazy large rooms. I'm not sure if clubhouse is the final stop for lullaby, and for a lot of different rooms, there might be a better place in the future. But for right now, it gave us the opportunity to speak to a couple 100 people a night to really control a stage and make sure we have had trolls, I don't know that there have been those people in a while. And actually, there's been a few people that have come in and intentionally disrupt the room and then have later apologized and come back as true guests of the room. Which is really inspiring about the lullaby club is that people are seeing how beneficial it is and that like hey, yeah, I could go in and scream and obscenity and really ruin the atmosphere that was created. But then they see the kind of beneficial beneficial components to the room and what it's doing for people. And I think that some folks have been like, Oh, I you know, I control on a on a Facebook post. But this is actually like a place for for sincerity. And, you know, it all came from Axel. And Aviva is the co founder of it and they do 50 60% of the work and there's stuff that they're doing every single day on top of Axl being an independent artist, in a really damn good one. So it does really take a team and there's been growing pains for sure, there's been some slight turnover, you know, none of us are getting paid. yet. We hope that that's something we can change in the future. But it's all you know, building a brand and building a community. So it's one step at a time. And, you know, just trying to scale reasonably. We've had our first lullaby Europe consistently on Sundays, I believe. There's the East Coast time that I host, so we hope that it only grows and grows as as time goes on in past when the world opens up, per se and all that.
Cool. Well, thank you so much, Ross. I mean, I know there's all kinds of different pieces you could play but since I happen to mention that Do you want to play the two front facing windows? Well, I
have no idea how that went because that was a song made up on the spot. I'm not sure if I have the the listing anymore, but um, I could play something different. I don't know if if two songs was alright, or anything like that. But if not, I'd gladly pass the microphone to whomever is next.
I think we'd love one more and then then we'd love to hear from others and the amazing artists on stage.
Sure.
This one's called funniest thing. This one is out right now on Spotify and it will be up it'll be on the EP coming out on Thursday so it mean the world if you guys check that out.
We got into in one nice big pf I don't remember the reason had ran out of words to say. You walked away. Sure you win and as you did you lost your balance and fell flat on your face. He was so mad. I couldn't help I thought it was the funniest thing. Watch you tombola Thunder Have you tried store man away? Watch you tumble. Thunder you try and storm said something smart as I got out of your car and took your smile with me. weather was bad. When I tried to get back in you locked up the whole machine. I was so mad you couldn't help but laugh You thought it was the funniest thing. To take my dry wit and dredge the middle of the board and re take my dry with drench find and search by kissing mega by door every moment she brings. it all stems from love and caring too much rather changes from winter to spring. We're just so glad we can help alive See, we think it's the funniest thing. How storm clouds pass but you win me last go together like thunder and rain. How storm clouds pass, but you win me last go together like thunder and rain. Thank you so much.
Thanks so much. Thanks.
I was awesome. Ross. Thank you. So this is imagination, action. We're recording this. So as of at the end of the show, you can hear the whole thing again, you could hear it multiple times before the sun rises if you want, and there'll be a transcript available. You're in for a real treat with our next musician. Corey. He is phenomenal. One of my favorite musicians of all time. He plays an instrument that I believe Leonardo da Vinci helped, helped work with. But before we hear from Corey, I just want to telegraph that. We're gonna hear from Carolyn after Corey. And then Pete you're gonna close this out. And pilot who is the first African American lead harp system of the BSO Boston Symphony Orchestra is on a train and I don't think we were able to get her. So we have two last musicians. Pete, thank you for that story earlier. And Carolyn, thank you for playing that Bach piece at the beginning. But Pete, we're going to have you close this out at the end and I look forward to having you play a clip. Are you ready at the end to be our closer? Yep. Good. Awesome. And then Carolyn, can't wait to hear from you. And I hope your violin is insured in case you break it. Under one
yeah, it is
great and we can't wait. Can you do a music interlude like 60 seconds for for Cory, just as a way to create some pomp and circumstance for him coming up next.
Totally.
I'm gonna play just a little bit of a mysterious opening from Fritz Kreisler number called luggage Tana Now you can do it.
Great. I'm so excited to introduce Cory Cory, you played at New England Conservatory, which is like the Juilliard for Boston. I'm really proud that you showed up there with an accordion saying that you were ready to be taught, you know, not an instrument that they had a lot of people playing. And, you know, the Clintons had you play at a steak dinner, I think you were the youngest musician to ever play at a steak dinner for I think, the head of the president of Hungary. And I know you've played in the White House a number of times. You're a world champion in the accordion. Three different genres. And I know earlier, you played some jazz. And I think you even said you hadn't played jazz recently or ever on it. So just shows how incredibly versatile you are at playing the accordion? I'd love to understand what do you love about the accordion? What do you want to show us that you can do with your accordion?
I love that you
feel like you are putting I feel like you're like a character in Greek mythology, you're putting the world on your back. You're putting the accordion industry on your back and you're trying to represent it. You know, you found a way to decorate your accordion even though there isn't an industry to do that. And, and you represented so well. And I know that the accordion was more popular than learning the guitar, like close to 100 years ago. And I wonder if you're bringing it back to that same status. So the floor is yours. Welcome, Cory.
Thank you, john. Thank you, john. And actually, it was right through the 50s that the accordion in the United States at least was was that popular and the guitar was still behind it. And funnily enough, when they were crossing, in late 50s, there was a magazine called accordion and guitar magazine, because they were about equally as popular, which is just hilarious to think about. But every country has a completely different history of the instrument, I mean, literally boarded a border Canada, the US, Scotland, to England, Ireland, Argentina, to Brazil, they all have kind of different histories, and they all play different accordion. So there's many, many different kinds of recordings and a level of popularity today and across history, but I
actually let me let me also just ask you, I like the Dropkick Murphys, and I like They Might Be Giants. But even those two bands, is the accordion just kind of like a side side thing. And they're not really weaving it in. And they're not doing it justice.
Yeah, I mean, most of the time, you're gonna hear accordion in any facet like that, you might hear more than just holding a chord, which is mostly what is used for in popular music the past 70 years. But even then, I mean, you're basically using a Ferrari 458 to go three miles an hour. It's no one really ever shows what it can do. And people don't know what it's capable of even the other night. The guy who runs the hiring musicians for America's no American Idol. They wanted accordion and he just plays piano. So he stuck in accordion on and went on stage. And he can't play lefthand you can tell he can't even hold the instrument. But no one knows is like yeah, that was great. Great. Isn't accordions, what are you doing? But it's been like this for for a while, in the US? Because when rock came in, it was at the same time when you really had the first generation in America that not they really didn't want to do what their parents did. You know, it's like a vicious, whatever you do. I don't want to do that into the 60s and their parents all played accordion. And they said, No, I want to do this new thing rock and play guitar. And basically, you wouldn't be caught dead by the late 60s, playing accordion on a gig when in the late 50s. It was totally normal. It was a drastic decline. And I've talked to many
music Yeah, you can play rock so well in the
UK. It's not like it's like oil and water. It's you know, right. It's not like you you're held hostage to the polka? No, it's it's it's kind of an image the end the reason I've tried to redesign accordion things, because at the end of the day you need music has become far more about the entertainment aspect than the actual ability of music and carry a 25 pound thing that the dead dog looks like an air condition is not very sexy with a guitar you can wail it around, spin around, jump around on stage, you can't really do that so much of the accordion. And even pianos had this trouble. You know, they went to Keith
Townsend right he like would lifted above his head and
trust me I have tried practicing spinning the You know, throwing it on my head, it just it looks ridiculous. But the instrument itself is just I mean, it's astounding what it's capable of. It's the only instrument in the world where you can play, say, 14 notes at the same time, but also have complete control of the volume at every millisecond, like the voice or violin or clarinet. But all those instruments only, you know, they only play one note, and guitar and piano, you can play a ton of notes. But once you hit the note, you can't change the volume, the accordion is the only one that can do all of it. And it's portable. It's really the only instrument with two different systems on the left hand is a completely different system than the right hand. And then every accordion around the world has different systems. So when you travel, you have to bring yours because different countries came up with their own right hands. And some countries play two different systems themselves. So it's a really crazy instrument and so many cultures around the world the accordion is not only, you know, somewhat important, but it's vital like you can't have a French band at your wedding on Italian Bandy wedding or an Argentine band Are you winning or Brazil band or a klezmer band on and on Irish band? Without an accordion? There's so many genres of the world you absolutely must have accordion but in America, it just hasn't. hasn't been that so I started playing because my my dad dalyan family, and my dad played way back when it was popular, and then quit as a little kid because no one do it anymore. They took it out when I was nine years old. And they said, Do you want to play accordion? And I want to you know, make sure my dad was proud. I was like, Okay, I'll play accordion. And then we quickly realized I had a talent for it. And I was always very competitive in everything I did. But I was never good at sports.
You have a talent for it. And, and everyone on the show. And people have seen this recorded You will soon see. So you should write in your diary that this is the date night that you heard Cory play.
I wouldn't say that. But it's just I was I used my competitive You know, this is the thing I wasn't good at sports, I was I've loved watching them I do articles write about them. And I also play it with Formula One events, I do stuff with the Red Bull f1 team and Plato's thing. So I've always been kind of more in the sport idea. But music became my sport because I couldn't, you know, wasn't tall enough to play basketball do any anything like that. So this became that aspect and and then that was my motivation to try to be to a try to become one of the best accordion players in the world. And then with that, the tried to get the image out of what it's been this stagnant image with, with all the correct stereotypes of it. You know, when people think accordion, especially agents, I've still never actually acquired an agent in my whole career. Because every time I get to one, they go, Wow, it's amazing what you can do with that thing. But I don't know what to do with accordion, you know, like I was supposed to do with accordion.
So this still show Korea I get the theme about the you know, changing its image. But now, why don't you kind of showcase and model? how great you are at it. I mean, you really do have skills when you play and tell us a little bit about what you're playing or what you're thinking and show us the range? I think
it's it's a little a little bit tough. Without video, as a, you know, Terri when she was like, how are you doing that with the bass. But you can see a million things of course on YouTube. But if I just played one that the people usually would would know is that sounds completely different. If I just played that techno tunes Sandstorm that people usually ask me to play if I just played that on the acoustic accordion. Okay, it would it would sound like this.
You know, kind of dead boring. But I play electric accordion. And one of the things I'm trying to change the image of the accordion to showcase what is possible with it. And the electric accordion really shows what you can do with the bellows because you know piano and others was they don't have the bellows, you just have touch sensitivity versus the touch sensitivity with the bellows. So if I just put all the other sounds on it, I don't know how this will exactly sound over the phone. But this is the same thing. I'm playing the same thing. But with all these extra sounds. So this would sound like this and get the let's see.
So I can I mean, I've played weddings and parties where they don't hire a DJ. I'm just the DJ. And then of course I can play if someone requests something randomly while I'm playing. I could switch to it and things like that. But it's all possible with the accordion because you you have so much going on with with the different systems. And it's the best really the best way to learn music theory. I would push it in schools and actually China has decided over the past 10 15 years that they're using accordion to teach music theory because they realize, you know, everyone says you got to learn piano. To learn music theory, well piano is only 1/3 of the accordion, you have the bellows for phrasing and the left hand teaches you the line of fourths and fifths, or as they say, circle, but I'm more calling a line, because it does go on forever and your major minor seven diminished chords, which no matter how advanced music you will talk about, every chord is somehow based on major minor seven diminished. So you really learn everything about music theory, in learning the accordion. So it's just, it's unfortunate that it's kind of become much more of a joke, or it just plays poker, which poke is one of the areas it's kind of survived like Cajun zydeco music in New Orleans. That was another area where the accordion did survive when it died in the 60s. But it can do anything. I mean, I play Tango gigs, French music, gigs, lots of klezmer, of course, lots of jazz. I started doing all classical it there's nothing It can't do obviously electronic and techno and rock and funk this but the only thing you can't do is rap and I probably could back up a rap. So it's nothing the accordion kid do.
Yeah, well, can you can you play a range like do like, like a sizzle reel of your greatest hits?
sizzle reel. I'll just click through let's see what we come across it some sub different sounds. If I went to I said French music. Okay, so if I did that, it would sound something like that. See here.
You would hear maybe walking in France. This would be some let's see.
Tango you could do if we went to Italy, maybe it'll be like
max did some basa earlier. Of course, level Joe beam stuff in the accordion is hugely popular there.
Be some boss, that kind of stuff. Maybe a blues, kind of be three organism.
do that kind of thing. We could do. Maybe some kind of a classical Mozart thing. I don't know. Let's
do the craziest thing probably on here, which is the jazz voices which most people is their favorite.
So that that's all on the accordion. There is nothing else that I'm attached to. Or you could just have a standard accordion that you might hear maybe in the middle of Europe.
Before we go too crazy if I do some kind of a rock thing. Let's see.
Like how about Sergeant Pepper? Can you play Sergeant Pepper The Beatles something that's pretty recognizable. What? Anything?
Let's go see someone's remember
or just any Beatles song.
Let's see if I go to
such as Lonely Hearts Club.
Where's the clean guitar? Maybe. Let's see
So I have like acoustic guitar in the right hand, I have a different kind of guitar and a left hand and a little bit of drum. So it depends on on the genre, but this is kind of anything you can do on here, between between your 10 things and random factoid the accordion takes nine fingers to play, not 10 your your thumb on your left hand really doesn't do much of anything. So if you go on Jeopardy, and they happen to have that one.
Great, does anyone have any questions for Corey, before we go to Carolyn? I mean, Cory I think you're so versatile. You're such a great ambassador for this instrument. And you know, I definitely want to help amplify your career and I want you everywhere and I'm a little self conscious United States is behind some of these other countries in the accordion so I'm glad we have you. I am
actually working on doing some kind of a concert in Finland with a North Korean accordion player as some kind of relations you know thing because they're they actually have incredible accordion players and
what countries have you played for like you've been you've gone to competitions around the world just Can you tick off some of the country Yeah,
I've The only continent I haven't been to is Antarctica which if you know anybody down there I'd love to go down and play for some penguins cross that one off but I played in Dragon
I can happen that Oh
yes, you can can Oh, my God, you
know, might save that I do it for almost nothing basically just to go down and do that. And I'm a snow not. JOHN does ever have too many hobbies. I should consult them but I'm a complete snow and winter nuts. I'd love to see some snow down there. But I played in New Zealand, Japan, Ireland, most of central Europe, Tunisia a couple of times, Brazil. So it's pretty much pretty much all over the place. Finland. Many times Finland's a huge accordion country. Now all Scandinavia really is. So I haven't and Ukraine I did Ukraine just recently before the pandemic, another huge accordion country where I played a masterclass at a college. And there was 150 students that came to my masterclass. There's not 150 young people that play in America, for God's sakes. And there was 150 at this one college to hear my masterclass. So,
like bagpipes is another instrument. It's not that heavy. It's not as heavy as an accordion. But like do bagpipers get along with accordion players, or is there like a rivalry? Well,
no, no, it's definitely not a rivalry. But most jokes that are said about accordion are usually you know, interchange between banjo or banjo as well, and the bagpipes and accordion there's always the jokes that kind of get swapped around with the three of them. But um, I mean, it's, it's fun. I've always enjoyed being kind of that strange guy of being, you know, if I go on a plane and, and people go, Oh, what's that? And I go according they go,
Oh, do you play poker?
And I'll usually go, Well, I
can. But then, you know,
why don't I play for you guys. And I've played many times on a plane. And you know, shocked everyone on the plane, like when I thought that was a poker instrument. So it's just kind of a grassroots effort of trying to get people to realize that it's so much more capable than it's mostly used for. But, you know, I've enjoyed the challenge. And it's definitely been my entire life's work of trying
to show here I have an idea. So before we go to Carolyn, anyone who has an instrument on stage, can we just like, open it up in like, a jam session?
I don't know how it worked. We dry with the timing.
Carolyn Ross. Haley, Max. I mean, I may be revealing my ignorance on music. Like
I would say to Carolyn, I don't know if you know the shown Rosemary in there since you were playing Chrysler. Yeah.
Can you harm it? Can you?
Yeah,
yeah. That was
like a version of summertime.
Yeah, everybody probably knows some sets, two chords or three chords. Pick a key.
Carolyn and Cory you you started and then Max and Haley and Ross if you feel so moved to join if you don't, this has been recorded. You will not be embarrassed if you want to join in the fun. We'll see. All right.
This could be what can
I do? summertime? Yeah, just give me a key. Oh, I'm gonna start
to feel it out.
I'm going to start enough. Sure. Oh, you just started Okay. Okay. Do you mind Sound I
don't even know what happened.
She joined click Carolyn joined clubhouse like, like 10 minutes before the show.
I couldn't even hear anything that was going on.
No, no. The thing is with any kind of internet music that we've done over the pandemic, as long as one person leads and another person just follows, and the leader doesn't listen, it can work out. But
yeah, David Chang is recording this. You can listen back to it in a few minutes once we posted. Allison, did you want to call in anyone? Before we go to Carolyn?
Well, I just first of all wonder thank you guys so much. I mean, the the many things I love about clubhouse and john Sessions is it kind of turns into Improv Theater. But that was the closest I've seen and we've just loved having you with us every week, Kaylee and Cory and others. Have I? I just wanted to check because the thing I love about clubhouse, the done and I learned early on is it's not just about us asking questions, but really each other the people on stage and in the audience asking questions. And I think Dr. Ahmed, you're listed as Orca boy, but you've been on the stage the whole time. I didn't know if you had any questions for anyone and just have are really talented musicians. I'd love to know if anyone has any questions for anyone. Before we go to a wrap up.
I just want to point out that Maggie Curran is in the audience, Max's mom. So it's great to see you, Maggie.
Hi, Alison.
I've just I just came to listen really. Kunal I think when he was he called me up because he can during this awareness and fundraising event that they held for the crisis in India. I performed at that. And so I think he pulled me up because of that. But uh, yeah, like he said, I work as a doctor and I was working late shift today and on the way home. I had just turned this on, and I Hayley was playing, and is and it was really, it was pretty beautiful. It's 1:30 in the morning here right now, so I don't think I'd love to play for you. Maybe, but, uh, the people asleep and so what I do is play from my car.
Yeah, what I'd love to hear is also it's so fascinating because your bio says that music is medicine. And I just think it's so fascinating. Like, you're you are a doctor, but you get that music is this fundamental medicine, like how do those two interact? I mean, do you? Do you ever bring music into the medical world?
Well, I mean, I guess interesting. I not directly when I'm with patients, I don't directly say hey, I wrote this song, I haven't listened to it, how does it make you feel you know? But I think from from writing, songs and ice, write poetry before that, and from listening to it, and the feelings and the things that evoke within you the thoughts that are provoked. You then take that and you kind of when you see patients, that also you transfer to them. energy that you get from all different kinds of things positive energy and then you transfer that positive We need somebody else. The same way, like when someone dumps negative energy, sometimes people can dump that on somebody else too. So it's kind of, that's the way I approach it, I guess, I guess it does have an impact. But indirectly, I don't directly use it. But I would also like to do that to you see, which is why, because I've been writing songs for a long time. But I've only past few months, I've started kind of like, getting, you know, getting, I've made a Spotify account. At the moment, I've got nothing original in the public domain, although I've performed some original stuff. But that's where I'm trying to get that stuff produced. And I'm a novice when it comes to that. But I'd like to start sharing it with people because, you know, the feedback that people have been giving me over the past several years. And I seen the connection now between medicine and music, and it's, they both heal. And that's the key thing. And I guess I'm a healer. That's why I'm in this profession. And if you can heal in more ways than one, why don't you know?
Well, it's so beautiful. I'll turn it back to john to take us home. But you know, I was in South Africa, right before the pandemic and got introduced to sound healing. And it's just such a fascinating notion in indigenous societies, they really believe that our bodies are energetic frequencies. And that playing music heals. And of course, this whole evening has been all about that, both as a metaphor and physically and in lots of different ways. I think we all heal each other, but it's just really cool to make it explicit, and to have you all meet each other.
Yeah, no, this is great. And we're gonna keep having musical interludes between our speakers throughout our weekly show. And we really wanted to celebrate our musicians than the last two musicians tonight, or our Carolyn, I know, you played a piece at the beginning, you just did some improv. I don't know if you want to play another piece, but love to hear a little bit about your journey as a musician. I know you went to Juilliard, and you're a very accomplished violinist, and, and then you're, you're gonna be bringing us home. I know you're working with youth, and in addition to being a musician, but you have an interesting perspective. And I think, you know, maybe you'll play one of those pieces that you work with some of the students that you've been working with. And then I think Allison has some wrap up remarks that she's been kind of working on. But that's gonna be the end of the show. And this is all being recorded. And thanks for joining us. This is a long night. But imagination action, we love to showcase amazing people who are using their imagination and putting in action. And we create audio grams in a podcast out of this. And this all be on our website imagination action club later tonight. So Carolyn, yeah. Tell us about you. Do you want to talk? Do you want to play? What How do you want to use this moment? Oh,
I'll do a little bit of both. I am grateful to be here. First of all, I've known Cory for years. And, you know, we've been interweaving throughout each other's lives. But I think he he actually just said this to me on a text message that it was the first time we've ever played together. And of course, it's in this moment. So I thought it was quite wonderful that it we were brought together. And funny. I thought it's very
actually Caroline to you. You've been listening the whole show, I assume, right?
Yes. By the way, it's Caroline
You know, that's a good one. Yeah, no, no, keep it up. Caroline, what do you think any interesting Hoss from hearing all the other musicians?
Yes, this time has been a very challenging time, I was particularly touched by what, you know, Max said, about, you know, this need for a reworking in music, education and preparing people? Was it me, I think it was Mexico that said this for the practical concerns of the world. And also as a musician in her 20s as well, I can affirm that notion. And I can emphasize and sympathize with with that. With that, you know, suggestion and that, that observation. It's been a challenging time. I'm looking very much forward to the creative output that will come in the months I'm closing the pandemic in and I see this kind of pandemic sort of in the slow demand you went do a slow diminuendo instead of a instead of, you know, this huge like, okay, let's hold it and stop at the end of the frame. I think that our lives all of us interweaving now together will be changed forever from this tragedy, really. But I also find that it is informing us every day to look at what is important in life, and to, you know, achieve our dreams in a new way that is actually more innovative and connected to what is really important, and what needs to be done for this world. So I'm thankful for all of you that have spoken. And I appreciate Haley's beautiful songs. And every bit Ross and Cory, everybody is so gifted. So I'm really grateful to be a part of this conversation in this over in this in this way. So yeah, that's all I have to say. I'm, I'm Thank you for having me. I can play something where I can listen to you. If you'd like to say another thing, john,
why don't you play when you play something and then we'll go to Pete.
Okay, I'll play a little fiddle tune to close to keep us on a light note. So so the beginning was was we have this beautiful jazz number. And then I did a little kind of dark piece on the violin. And now in D minor, by Bach. And now I will do another folk folk. That was from a dance by Bach partita. And dedicated to his, the I don't know if it's dedicated, but it was because of his first wife's death. So now we will bring a light note. And we will do a little Irish fiddle tune by Liz Carroll who was living today.
Wow, that was incredible.
Oh, I haven't played that in a long time. It was one of my goals for the pandemic was to learn to do repertoire. So I tried to learn Irish fiddle. But that was a beautiful piece by Liz Carroll.
And Kelly, you should mention about the the lunar thing you were talking about that? The music project, the Moon Lunar project thing?
Oh, yeah. Yes, I'm doing a small project. That is called lunar Bach. And it requires large things and large actions. But I am looking forward to the scope of the world. And it's more so my idea of, it's more this, this project is dedicated to looking at the world in a in a lens that marries and tries to unify what is happening around us in tech, to what I do to what, as a musician personally, and through the lens of a more generalized notion of formality, or formal systems. So it's more philosophical in thought. And that's why I'm just one one of the books that's inspired this idea is by Douglas Hofstadter called girdle Escher, Bach, from 1970s. But it's, it's basically about marrying ideas of, of, you know, of these, these beautiful figures in nature and patterns in nature and in, in, in our worlds that we create together. And that, you know, we are part of, and how, down to Einstein's theory theory, you know, relativity basically even that, but it's just, I don't know, much else to say, but I hope to, to discuss this in in a way that that makes sense for for my, for my learning for my learning. And that's it. It's
Caroline, that's awesome. And looking forward to having you participate more in the future on our shows. And I have one question before we go to Pete. I'm curious to Irish music that you were learning how unique is that to Irish culture? Like do other cultures? Who, who, you know, have the violin as a music tradition? Play music that has that kind of, you know, wait, wait, what is unique to it?
In ways of You mean the ornamentation and the slides? Yeah. In terms of Okay. Yes, you know, there are other, there are other aspects. There are other dialects, say, a fiddle music, you know, and all kinds of other fiddle music is just another generalization. But there's Celtic music that is sort of an umbrella of Irish fiddle music, and Scottish fiddle music and all kinds of other places in the world, including Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia, Canada, which is where I studied, some of my childhood was spent there studying some, some of their music, which is an integration of the Scottish and Irish styles along along with other other styles too, and in a more minute way. But the Irish style is is, is, you know, you can also look at it and other forms of art, if you see in Irish dancing, versus, you know, stuck dancing, which is from Cape Breton Island region, it's a very different type of dance. And you can feel that rhythmically in the music, when played really correctly, and really well, you can feel those differences in form and in in style. And so, yes, you know, while some of those, there are similarities in that in the, in the general principles of the music, um, you know, among Celtic traditions, and also folk traditions, but, but they're, they're also beautiful, diverse elements that come through each of them that, that I enjoy looking at, in various aspects of life. So it's a metaphor, I guess.
Wow, you seem to definitely have a great perspective on the world. And, and
thank you very much. I look forward to listening to the, you know, the lineup looks wonderful. And I look forward to listening to more talks to come in and seeing what what comes to from this beautiful from all of the this beautiful plethora of people with us today and also from this podcast. So thank you. Right.
Great. All right. So Pete, you're you're an empath. You're, you're giving a voice to many you're healing you're, you're using music and really special ways. You know, how do you want to use these last few minutes to kind of tell your story and what you're up to? I know you did a little bit earlier. But I always want to support your great work. Thank you, john,
I think yeah, I mean, I told the story a little bit about the experience in park and I think the best thing to do, john is just let me let me let these young people speak for themselves. I'm going to pick the song off they wanted a moment of silence in the song so I'm just gonna play the back third of it. And here's what they had to say.
But I just want to try. Gonna need a day. Promise. Just stay strong. Can you buy
Beautiful stuff, Pete. Thank you so much for your work and for sharing. And I'm excited to amplify this work on our imagination action channels. Allison, anything in closing?
Gosh, I almost feel like this hearing more music would be closing. I don't know. Are you sure you want a verbal summary? Or should we just ask a few people on stage to play a little bit more?
Why don't you just share some thoughts? If anyone wants to play they can do that. But I think you're you're you're good at kind of pulling some threads together.
Oh my gosh, well, this was just one of my most favorite evenings. And if you go to the website, john has called imagination and action club, you'll know we've covered space, sports, politics, all kinds of interesting topics. But I think that music just brings with it such heart and such passion. And I feel like tonight was a fabulous fusion evening. We had opera jazz, folk, Italian, Polka. I'm not even sure how to classify Corey, some of what you play violin, accordion and guitar voice. It was just so just so rich. I think some of the things I took away are that James and Terri reminded us that music is a spiritual force. It's a healing force that inspires us and helps us to be better than we are at the moment. And Terri talked about playing without any boundaries in such a way that it would inspire an abused woman in the audience to decide to walk out of the abusive situation. So just that level of commitment. I think I learned tonight that music can be deeply political. I never really understood that. James talked about the Nazis successfully disappearing 1000s of musical scores, and the challenge of waking people up to a whole treasure trove of music that was lost and officially banished. In the 1930s and 40s. Terri talked about the journey of curating 101 lead sheets by female composers, reminding us that playing music is not inherently male sport. And then Haley beautifully serenaded us with us. Story song about Bethany a five foot woman with hair down to her knees. I just thought that was fantastic, Ellie. JOHN asked so many great questions tonight. But one of them was where does creativity come from? Haley, I think you described that it comes from staying in houses and getting a glimpse into so many people's lives, sort of from their living rooms. There were just so many paths that brought people into music for Haley. It was coffee houses and church basements. For Alex it was finding opera by accident in a well funded arts program at high school. I think that diversity was amazing. Alex reminded us of the sport of singing I know john you call Corey the LeBron James of the accordion. But I will forever have an image in my mind of singing opera Nathan's hot dog stand in Coney Island on a cherry picker in front of 40,000 people. And I think that Pete talked about the power of art in addressing trauma. And beautifully as you displayed for us the the songwriting process where the kids play, came up with a song called Hear me out, I am not okay. And creating a silent break in the song to represent 17 classmates who were who were lost. I think the whole process of songwriting as part of healing and turning emotions into sound. And kids actually saying, This is what we want to tell us. This is real. This is what it feels like to us. So it was just an incredible night. Ross talked about how seven nights a week at 9pm Pacific, there's an artist showcase called clubhouse lullaby and it's a chance to unwind and provide for spite from 21st century chaos outside I think we all could use that despite and it's all run by volunteer labor. And its sounds have completely changed his and mine and many other people's Spotify lists. And then we had Dr. Ahmed talking about the connection between medicine and music, and describing the fact that he is a healer and that there are many ways to heal. And we're just learning about a lot of them. And then Cory made a strong appeal that we should bring back the accordion. I think it's a very effective grassroots lobbying. He said music came my sport and took me to Formula One and the White House. It's the only instrument where you can play 14 notes at the same time. And China's using the accordion to help their kids learn music theory as john says, We never want to be too far behind China. So I'm going to end with Korea's quote he said I, I always enjoy being that strange guy. Bringing the accordion and playing many times on an airplane. I only hope that I sit next to Cory on the next flight. Thanks.
We'll do it. We'll do
So if anyone wants to play, but I think that's enough of talking. But this has been a great night.
I'd like to play something I've been listening to
Are you in your car?
I've just come to the car. Yeah.
No, I was gonna ask you go to your car. No, that's awesome. Bring it
let me just check this guitars in tune.
And I just wanted to thank you guys for having me and, and talking about the club. And I'll actually be hosting it tonight at midnight eastern time. So this will be my my sign off and I can't wait to hear another song. And it was amazing to be surrounded by so much talent tonight. It was so great. Thanks, john, for having me. Thanks, Alison.
Thanks, Ross.
I'm ready. Whenever you guys I think I've always in
Orcaboy, can you also email me Jay Warner w e r n er@mit.edu. I want to have I want to list you as one of our performers for tonight. At some point, you don't have to do it now.
Sure, john, thank you very much. This a song I wrote a couple months ago. It came just came to me as a song does I guess but it's about it was my grandmother. She's she was she's slowly fading away. We're slowly losing her to Alzheimer's. And it made me think you know about you, she doesn't recognize me anymore. She'll recognize me for about 10 seconds and then you have to remind and it's called black and blue. Can you hear that? Okay.
Yes.
Come on. What can I do? So I think we could talk about
it sounds great to us. It sounds perfect.
This is
sorry about this guy.
No. And by the way, Dr. Ahmed, I just like to speak on behalf of your patients and say that there isn't one that wouldn't love to hear this but we're lucky enough to be getting this this performance tonight. Thank
you. Linda, cinema. What can I do? To be in? Pain and sign swirling and signing? Lachlan blue. You taste of this loan someplace from the pain that I face. And when the moves on display, I think about you learn the lessons he taught me I belong to spit Main cinema cannot do being able to feel pain and saying swirling action will you taste this long story my home was strange creatures walk out on the road with a heart of stone hitchhiking in visions of the days before I never wanted to run. Bow when you love you left with the sun almost not linger fish visions clear to all of you cinema cannot do that pain and saying swirling it's you feeling the money a taste of this loan someplace among black, blue black and blue. black and blue. Black Black Black Black. Yo black Thank you.
That was so extraordinary. Wow, what a perfect way that to end the evening. John's given me the very tough role that close that our room because to be honest, my favorite moments on clubhouse all involve music. And I could go on listening to your amazing talents all night. But Pete, Max, Cory Caroline, Haley, Ross, ferrars, James, Terri, and Alex, thank you so much, john, my amazing host who has more than 200 speakers lined up, I would just want to close out letting you know that clubhouse low buy and Ross and his amazing team are available every night, midnight East Coast time, Monday to Thursday and Saturday 9pm they do it a little bit earlier for US East coasters. Although midnight works great for me. And then Sunday, they do it for Europe. So I think you can sign up for that. And then of course imagination and action is this group, which is every Tuesday from six to 8pm. Eastern and sometimes 8pm plus plus, you can get all the recordings we've done on imagination and action club. JOHN is an unbelievable sort of curator of talent. And really I love the show because we have such rich topics, really heartfelt exchanges, and just the most extraordinary talent that you can imagine. And it's thanks to John's vision and his leadership and I'm so honored to have you all join us. I'm very sorry to close out any room with this much talent still left on the stage. But for those of you who want to in less than think 53 minutes, you can hear Ross MC a great show tonight. So thank you all for joining thanks to David for his work and canal for hosting us and Just all the creative talent that goes into making clubhouse the platform it is. Thank you all.
Thank you. Thank you, john. And thank you, everybody.
Thanks, Alison and john. This is so great. Thank you everybody. Beautiful music.
Thanks. And yes, come join us anytime. So Hayley and Cory play for us almost every time and anyone else is welcome to to add to that. We love it. Thank you guys for coming and Ross thanks for guesting and everybody. Thanks for the talent and listening. Take care. Bye bye.
