Author: DJB

Christ Thile

Acoustic music is alive and well

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“When you go to heaven and hear singing, it will sound like these three women.” So opined Chris Thile after the Americana trio I’m With Her finished a short yet moving set in the first half of an incredible three hours of music last evening at the Kennedy Center.  The concert hall’s acoustics were ringing all evening as the sold out crowd not only enjoyed the beautiful harmonies from I’m With Her’s Sara Watkins, Sarah Jarosz, and Aoife O’Donovan, but also the instrumental talents and music-making of mandolinist extraordinaire Thile and the Punch Brothers, along with Bela Fleck and Edgar Meyers, virtuosi of the banjo and upright bass respectively. The Kennedy’s Center policy against photography leaves me using old photos from other concerts, but that hardly matters. The music was the focus last evening. Thile was invited to curate a four-day American Acoustic Music Festival, and Friday evening’s show was clearly the headliner.  The Punch Brothers  opened the first half of the show with a tight set capped by the raucous Rye Whiskey.  I’m With Her followed, with …

Jarosz and O'Donovan

Observations from the road: The celebrity sighting edition

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I have been on the road forever it seems.  So here are a few “Observations from the road…” posts which are – as always advertised – quirky and perhaps not ready for prime time.  You’ve been warned. Celebrity Stalking:  True story.  As I was walking through National Airport earlier this afternoon following a flight back from Chicago, I noticed two young ladies carrying cases for a guitar and mandolin.  I had been focused on getting something for a late lunch before rushing to the office, but my brain did engage to the point where I said to myself, “That sure looked like Aoife O’Donovan – and I bet that was Sarah Jarosz with her.” At this point you may be asking yourself, just who are Aoife O’Donovan and Sarah Jarosz? Well, for music lovers who veer away from the Taylor Swift variety of music, they are two-thirds of one of the most terrific — yet widely unheralded — music groups today:  I’m With Her. (And no, they are not connected to the Hillary Clinton campaign.  …

A Philly Family Weekend

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Candice, Claire, Andrew and I gathered this weekend in Philadelphia to celebrate the wedding of Julia Pentz and Barry Katz.  It was a special time for us all. Gathering with friends from our fifteen years when we lived in the Shenandoah Valley community of Staunton, Virginia (and with their children – who now live around the world) was a special treat.  Candice and I remember when Julia was born. Over the years we have seen Julia and her parents at least once a year and we are delighted that she has found such a wonderful life partner in Barry.  The setting at the Curtis Arboretum was beautiful, the new friends we made were delightful (good people attract good people), and the threat of summer thunderstorms never materialized. We also had a great time getting acquainted with parts of the city.  As I posted earlier, Candice and I arrived first and explored some of the Philadelphia food scene at Amada on Friday evening.  By Saturday morning Claire had joined us as we wandered through the multitude …

The Value of Six

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Leonard Pitts, columnist for the Miami Herald, has written a sobering column this morning entitled “Trust me, you know someone who has been raped.” “The Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network says that one woman in every six has been the victim of an attempted or completed sexual assault. It’s an awesome, awful number. Think about it in terms of women you know. Think about Bonnie, Kadijah, Heather, Consuela, Sarah and Kim. One, two, three, four, five … Six. Maybe she’s never told you, so maybe you think it didn’t — couldn’t — have happened, not to one of your six. But the numbers are what the numbers are. Maryum, Stephanie, Yumiko, Keshia, Laurie … and Pam. One, two, three, four, five … And six. It’s not a big number. You were counting past it in kindergarten.” Of course he’s right.  We all know someone who has been the victim of sexual assault. And we all know people – from work, social circles, extended family, really anywhere – who have been raped and never talk …

Fine Food in Philly

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The Browns are gathering in Philadelphia this weekend to celebrate the wedding of Julia – the daughter of our dear friends Ellen and Lundy Pentz –  and Barry Katz.  Claire arrives from the west coast late tonight, while Andrew arrives mid-day tomorrow, after recovering from the adrenaline rush of attending tonight’s Beyoncé concert in Baltimore.  (Can we say “excited?!”) That left Candice and me to our own devices today.  Naturally, we found some fine Philadelphia food. Julia and Barry had included Chef Jose Garces’ Amada restaurant in their list of recommended places to eat near the hotel.  We checked out the web site and jumped on it.  Here’s the site’s description of Chef Garces: “Since opening Amada in Philadelphia in 2005, Chef Jose Garces has emerged as an enormous talent and one of the nation’s most gifted chefs and restaurateurs. Today, he is the owner and operator of more than a dozen restaurants across the country, plus a thriving event planning division and 40-acre Luna Farm. He is a 2009 winner of the James Beard …

The Age of Wonder

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During high school graduation ceremonies for Andrew, one of the speakers built her remarks around a relatively new work at the time that captured the love of knowledge and learning. Five years later, I finally  picked up Richard Holmes’ The Age of Wonder (first published in 2008).  Sometimes it takes a while, but I try never to pass up a good book recommendation. And I’m so glad I did.  The Age of Wonder is a terrific work which looks at the growth of science in the Romantic Age.  Holmes tackles this broad topic with a blend of history, biography, art, science, and philosophy. In 500 pages that seem to fly by, the reader follows the intertwined stories of such historical luminaries as astronomer William Herschel and his sister Caroline, botanist Joseph Banks, chemist Humphry Davy, and writers such as Mary Shelley, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and John Keats. The book rightly received stellar reviews from the start, which I cannot top.  “Flat-out fascinating,” “groundbreaking,” and “superlative” are just a few of the descriptions applied to this …

Check Off Another One!

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My goodness, it has been a busy week of travel! Attend the Main Street Now 2016 conference on Monday and Tuesday in Milwaukee and get energized by all the work going on in downtowns across the country – check. Stop by and visit the amazing Mitchell Park Horticultural Conservatory Domes in Milwaukee – check. Catch a bad head cold and endure a 4 1/2 hour flight from Chicago to San Francisco – unplanned, but check. Have lunch in Carmel with one of the elder statesmen of preservation – the indefatigable Knox Mellon and his wife Carlotta – check. Celebrate the beginning of the construction phase of our work at Cooper-Molera historic site with more than 100 people from the city staff, California State Parks, our local stakeholders, and our development partners in Monterey – check. Over a wonderful dinner celebration in Monterey, talk baseball with the wife of one of our partners at Cooper- Molera, who has the perfect marriage…she’s a Red Sox fan and her husband is a Giants fan…so on the west coast …

I Do Love a Good Historic Hotel!

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After a long week of travel, it is good to land in a wonderful historic hotel for a couple of days of family time with Claire.  This beauty is the Biltmore Hotel in Los Angeles, one of my personal favorites where I’ve stayed in the past when in Southern California. Have a great Memorial Day weekend.  As you kick off the summer, take the time to remember those who have sacrificed for our country. More to come… DJB

Look Beyond Borders

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Amnesty International has posted a powerful video experiment to help all of us think about refugees as people, and not just as someone different from us. The video “is based on a theory that four minutes of uninterrupted eye contact increases intimacy.”  The theory, developed by psychologist Arthur Aron in 1997, was applied by Amnesty International to the refugee crisis, sitting refugees from Syria and Somalia opposite people from Belgium, Italy, Germany, Poland and the UK, with overwhelmingly positive results.  Here’s how the group describes its work: We decided to conduct a simple experiment during which refugees and Europeans sat across from each other and looked each other in the eyes. We recorded these very human encounters and the short film speaks for itself. Indeed it does speak powerfully for itself.  Do yourself a favor and watch these four minutes.  It is a good reminder of our common humanity, which seems to be in short supply in this political season. More to come… DJB