Short Takes
August 7, 2016
Words on Music: Introducing Robin Meloy Goldsby
When I launched Head Butler/Jesse Kornbluth Creative Services, I didn’t expect to be editing a manuscript by a Times best-selling writer — but that happened. Even more unlikely: I didn’t expect to be editing a collection of short stories by a writer who could be praised in the Times. The disclosure is that Robin Meloy Goldsby sent me ‘Manhattan Road Trip’ and paid me to suggest edits. The more important disclosure is that I made no more than a dozen marks on her manuscript.
Robin Goldsby is an American musician –– a Grammy-nominated lyricist, composer, author of four books and a children’s musical, with half a dozen CDs to her credit ––- who lives in Germany. Her stories are about musicians, some famous, some not, all burdened by the issues that artists (and many of us) face: the hunger for recognition, the challenge of excellence, the unfairness of time and age, the money thing.
What’s terrific about “Manhattan Road Trip” is her empathy for every character. In “Rouge Noir,” my favorite story, we follow Samantha Lockney, a world-class concert pianist. She was once the “It” girl of classical music; now she’s aging and her looks are fading. She has returned to her childhood home to perform the Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 3 with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. Also in town: a pop celebrity so famous she’s known by one name (“Baby”). Here come envy and competitiveness. Samantha on Baby: “Saw pictures of Baby in Vanity Fair last month. She was wearing a latex mermaid costume. Even with flippers and fishtail, she’s a looker. I remember how that used to feel. Seas parted, doors opened, and men with coffee breath and thinning hair told me I wasn’t just extremely talented, I was lovely. I believed every word. Fans surrounded me like fruit flies on a ripe peach.”
Baby, the ass-shaking star of the second story, has interrupted her international tour to attend the Pittsburgh funeral of her elementary-school music teacher, Mrs. Melozzi, whose daughter has asked her to perform Mrs. M’s favorite Debussy prelude for the funeral service. She’s having a crisis of confidence: “Goddamn Debussy. Why did he have to write complicated music that sounds so simple? ‘La Fille aux Cheveux de Lin’ — ‘The Girl with the Flaxen Hair’ — won’t sound good unless it sounds effortless. Effortless takes years.” Will Baby conquer Debussy? I held my breath on the last page. Anyone would.
If you play music at any level or know someone who does or is even contemplating a career in music, or if you like smart, reality-based fiction, or whatever, “Manhattan Road Trip” is at least as worthy as name-a-bestseller. [To buy the book from Amazon, click here. For the Kindle edition, click here.]
April 18, 2016
Trump: What’s the Deal?
25 years ago, I wrote a documentary about Donald Trump. He huffed and puffed, and the documentary was never shown. He’d kill it again if he could. But “Trump: What’s the Deal?” is now available on iTunes. The new trailer gives you the idea right off: “The old Trump. The new Trump. The same Trump.
March 8, 2016
Kids hold their breath. They love balloons and kites. They might also like this book about air.
How’s this for perfect timing: a children’s book about air, published on International Women’s Day by Maya Ajmera, President and CEO of Society for Science & the Public, and Dominique Browning, co-founder of Moms Clean Air Force, with a foreword by mega-mom Julianne Moore. “Every Breath We Take: A Book About Air” is written for 4-to-8 year- olds who are full of questions about everything. And this 32-page book, with terrific photographs of kids playing, investigating and just breathing, celebrates the importance of air (“You can hug yourself and feel the air moving in and out”), pounds home the need for clean air (“Dirty air can make us sick”) and offers an almost spiritual conclusion (“Clean air is like love. It’s invisible, but it makes life better.”) — it’s one more reason I wish my daughter could be small again. [To buy the book from Amazon, click here. For the Kindle edition, click here.]
March 7, 2016
Jesse, The Small Person, England: Advice, please
In an attempt to separate my 14 year-old daughter from her phone and her ignorance of anything that happened before last week, I’m taking her to England for a week or so in August. This is a splendid opportunity for me to play the part of Clark Griswold, Idiot Dad. I can’t. I won’t. So, beyond the obvious, I welcome suggestions that could take Not Altogether Annoying Dad and The Small Person past the velvet rope in London. And other destinations. Bath? Stonehenge? A day of walking? As ever, suggestions to HeadButlerNYC@AOL.com. And thanks.
December 27, 2015
“45 Years” — the movie for those who have attained a certain age
I saw “45 Years” this week — for the second time. I needed to watch the final few minutes again, I needed to see how Charlotte Rampling feels the full force of what has happened to her and realizes that she needs to do something about it. If you are young and new to love or only in the first few decades of a long-playing romance, this might not be the movie for you. (Go see “Spotlight,” “The Big Short,” “Brooklyn.” Avoid “Carol.”) But if you have achieved a certain age, if you have learned that intimacy is everything in a marriage and that there can be a very high cost to keeping your secrets secret, “45 Years” could be the movie of your year. Slow? Yes, like an Ingmar Bergman film is slow. But 95 minutes of Charlotte Rampling, looking every bit her age, fighting for understanding and balance? My God, I could watch that for days.