Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews the annual New Music America festival just completed in New York and sponsored by the Brooklyn Academy of Music and corporate donations. Whitehead questions the value of the 10 year-old festival.
Jazz vibraphonist Lionel Hampton. He introduced the vibes to the jazz world and remains one of it's undisputed masters. In the 1930's he played with the Benny Goodman's band -- being one of the first blacks to play with a white band. He's just written an autobiography, "Hamp." Al Capone and Louis Armstrong also play surprising roles in his life.
Critic at large Laurie Stone reviews the new movie, "My Left Foot." It stars Daniel Day Lewis as Christy Brown, an Irish painter and writer with cerebral palsy.
Brazilian singer/songwriter Caetano Veloso (kah-TAH-no vah-LOW-sah). He's revered as one of the primary architects of "tropicalismo," - a 1960's cultural and musical movement that reevaluated traditional Brazilian music and incorporated non-Brazilian musical styles. Leftist intellectuals denounced his music for it's use of foreign influences. In the late 1960's he was jailed and exiled from Brazil for his participation in the musical movement because the government feared the social force it might have.
Business executive Max DePree. DePree turned his company, a once obscure office furniture manufacturer, into the "nation's most admired corporation" (according to Fortune magazine). DePree has just published his thoughts on enlightened management in a new book called, "Leadership Is An Art." Whereas most management books these days push an Attila the Hun approach, DePree's is closer to Saint Francis of Assisi.
Film critic Stephen Schiff reviews "Steel Magnolias," starring Dolly Parton, Olympia Dukakis, Shirley McLain, and Darrell Hannah as a group of friends in a small Southern town.
John Fairchild, the publisher of "Women's Wear Daily," and "W." "Women's Wear Daily" is to the fashion industry what "The Wall Street Journal" is to the financial community. "W" is a glitzy fashion magazine. Fairchild has just written an insiders exposé of the fashion world, called "Chic Savages."
Rock critic Ken Tucker reviews the new album from Los Angeles rapper Ice-T. The album's called "Freedom of Speech...Just Watch What You Say." It's a blast back at groups such as the Parents Music Resource Center, which has been pushing for a rating system similar to the one use in the movie industry.
Jazz composer/clarinetist John Carter. He has just completed a five part music series chronicling the black migration experience from Africa to America: "Roots and Folklore: Episodes in the Development of American Folk Music. The final program in the series, "Shadows on A Wall," premiered recently as part of the New Wave Festival at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. The festival celebrates performers working on the edge of classical, rock, and jazz styles. Carter's performances are also out on disc.
Classical music critic Lloyd Schwartz reviews a recording of 18th century flute quartets by the Mannheim Quartet. The group performs several of Mozart's quartets here on original instruments.
Musicologist H.C. Robbins Landon. His new book, "Mozart: The Golden Years," traces the most troubling and creative period of the composers life, the years 1781-91. During this period, Mozart completed three controversial operas, married and wooed his wife Constanze Weber, became entangled in financial difficulties, and lived through the death of his father. In this book, the second of two volumes on the life of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Landon, further explores the link between Mozart's "manic depressive disorder" and his creativity.
The French Chef, Julia Child. She spent three decades explaining the mysteries of classic French cuisine to modern American audiences. Child has hosted several cooking shows on Public Television, earning Peabody and Emmy Awards in the process, and written several cookboks. Her new book, is titled "The Way to Cook." It's a 50-dollar tome that...in Child's words...tells "everything [I] know about the essentials of cooking today."
Rock historian Ed Ward examines the performers that led the way for Jerry Lee Lewis. Lewis burst on the scene in the late 50s, but Ed shows that lots of other guys were pounding the keys way before the killer.
Film maker Gus Van Sant. After years as an independent film maker in Portland, Oregon, and one full-length movie ("Mala Noche"), Van Sant has just finished "Drugstore Cowboy," starring Matt Dillon about a junkie trying to maintain his habit.
Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews "Warm Evenings," the new album by cornet player Warren Vaché (pronounced va-SHAY). On this album, Vaché teams up with classical music's Beaux-Arts String Quartet.
Former first lady Nancy Reagan. When the Reagans entered the White House, Nancy was a relatively anonymous first lady, best known for her strident "Just Say No" anti-drug campaign. But toward the end of President Reagan's second term, it became more apparent that Nancy Reagan's role in running the government was much larger than imagined, and it turns out many of her and her husband's decisions were influenced by a California astrologer. Nancy Reagan has a new memoir, called "My Turn."
