Year 2006

February 2nd, 2006

Hello Friends,

Here is a picture of Jack and me with Guns 'n Roses guitarist Gilby Clark at last night's Benefit for Victims of Hurricane Katrina hosted by Don Felder in Cerritos, CA. 

Aside from our Shaw Blades acoustic performance, we played "California Dreamin'" with Don Felder's band and were joined on stage by Stephen Stills and CSI Miami stars Adam Rodriguez and Rex Lyn. 

We played one song with Gilby Clark (Guns N' Roses), one song with Cheech Marin (Cheech and Chong), three with Alice Cooper, and finally the encore with everyone.

Talk about bang for the buck as far as those who bought tickets!  It was one night we'll be remembering for the rest of our lives.

TS
 
 

January 26, 2006

Hello Friends,

Last night Jeanne and I took her mother Iris and her husband Dale to see Billy Crystal's "700 Sundays" at the Wilshire Theater here in Los Angeles.  I'd recently read Billy's book and it got passed around in both our houses because everyone who read it wanted to share the stories with each other.  Then we heard about how successful it had been as a one man show on Broadway (I don't really keep up with what's up there but when I heard his name mentioned it caught my attention), had traveled to the largest cities in North America, and was about to open in Los Angeles.  It wasn't until we went looking for tickets that we realized just how hot a ticket it was.  One great surprise after another really.  His book is such a feel good experience, the fact that so many people agreed made me feel like I was part of some groundswell of enthusiasm that was so well deserved that hearing how hard these tickets were to come by and how high the price was being driven up at ticket brokerages was incredible.  After reading the story of his family, I felt like I was routing for relatives of my own.  That his tickets were becoming like tickets to see The Rolling Stones was a good indicator that I was not alone in this feeling.

I was a child of the 1950s so I related to most all of his time-stamped tales, and even though I grew up in Montgomery, Alabama, I did spend seven years of my life on Manhattan's Upper West Side and was easily able to transpose the colors, accents and states of mind back to the middle of last century and with a little suspension of disbelief put myself right there.

What really topped it off was Billy's connection to this play.  There's no faking true joy and passion on stage.  There's professionalism which can get you through when you're having a rough day, but his performance was proof that this was probably his finest hour as an artist.  This was confirmed when we met with Billy and his lovely wife Janice after the show.  He was still glowing from the previous three hours which went by leaving us wanting more.

To Billy and Janice, congratulations on your success thanks for doing the work to bring the story of your life to the stage and to the pages of your book for us all to enjoy.  Billy, thanks for the Polaroid.  You are a uniquely gifted entertainer.  I woke up this morning thinking about your show and feeling like I did as a kid on Christmas morning in the late 1950s. 

Bravo!

TS