Bidin’ My Time.

Art & Culture, Conscious Life, history, Jazz, Lifestyle, Music, Personal, Songwriting / Tuesday, August 12, 2025 / 6 minutes of reading

For a while now the phrase “Bidin my time” has filtered into my consciousness. It’s an old phrase that I heard frequently when I was growing up. I’m not sure if it’s used anymore, but just those three words, when spoken together, hold a multitude of meanings. Perhaps it’s the political climate or maybe it’s […]

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DAYA Music Festival of Indonesia 2024 (pt. 3)

Art & Culture, Dead Horse Records, Full Gallop Music, Indonesia, Jakarta, Jazz, Lifestyle, Music, Music Education, Travel, World Music / Tuesday, March 11, 2025 / 7 minutes of reading

Monday, July 8, 2024 Well, it’s done, the festival has ended and to say that I’m humbled by the experience would not be the most accurate words to best convey the joy and fulfillment I feel. I only slept about 3 hours and yet I’m still pumped up with adrenaline from the activities of the

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DAYA Music Festival of Indonesia 2024 (pt. 2)

Art & Culture, Dead Horse Records, Full Gallop Music, Indonesia, Jakarta, Jazz, Lifestyle, Music, Music Education, Travel, World Music / Wednesday, February 12, 2025 / 6 minutes of reading

Wednesday, July 3, 2024Up earlier than planned but still, I was excited for the day. We had lunch at the campus. Today was rehearsal day for the upcoming fundraising concert held in the spectacular home of Dedi Panigoro. With the band – Deviana piano, Jennifer Vincent bass, Suhandin Kosasih percussion, and Wahyu Prastya drums, we

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DAYA Music Festival of Indonesia 2024 (pt. 1)

Art & Culture, Full Gallop Music, Indonesia, Jakarta, Jazz, Lifestyle, Music, Music Education, Travel, World Music / Tuesday, January 14, 2025 / 8 minutes of reading

In 2009, I shared a blog post about my first trip to Jakarta, Indonesia. Since then, I’ve had the privilege of returning multiple times, each journey focused on the discovery and promotion of culture and art—specifically, the rich and diverse culture and art of Indonesia. Most recently, I embarked on my fourth visit to this

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Walking The Underground Railroad.

Art & Culture, Jazz, Peace Activism, Photography, Travel / Monday, September 5, 2022 / 8 minutes of reading

For most of my life, I have traveled extensively and quite frequently. Always on the go whether it was local traveling from within the city of New York, borough to borough or state to state, even country to country. I guess like all people encased inside the web of the two and half year pandemic,

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Tari Piring – Traditional Indonesian Dance

Art & Culture, Music Education, Road Life, World Music / Wednesday, May 20, 2020 / 3 minutes of reading

During the Covid 19 pandemic and choosing to self isolate, I decided that this was the perfect time to tackle some projects, confident that once this was all over, it would be difficult to come back to work on them at a later date. In the past, my schedule limited me from working on long-term

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Artist as Peace Activist

Art & Culture, Conscious Life, Creation, Peace Activism / Monday, June 22, 2015 / 5 minutes of reading

What is the artist’s responsibility, if any, to the state of the world? As we progress in life, sometimes, but not always, we begin to look at our lives and ask ourselves, what is my contribution? Some of us think that we can’t make a significant input unless we do something that a least gets mentioned in

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Baby, Scratch My Back….

Art & Culture, Lifestyle, Television / Monday, March 2, 2015 / 1 minute of reading

Being a singer, I’m hypersensitive to lyrics to songs. There a quite a few songs about scratchin’ where it itches. Most of them are blues titles. The title of this post, for instance, is taken from a Slim Harpo tune of the same name. Another “Scratch My Back” title song, written by Earl Cage, Raymond

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All In A Day’s Work…. part 3

Art & Culture, Indonesia, Jakarta, Jazz, Music Education, Road Life, Travel, World Music / Friday, May 23, 2014 / 4 minutes of reading

The final installment of my miraculous visit that became an unexpected journey. I would say that this is perfect timing. Why? Because in 3 days, I will back in the land of Java continuing another exploratory excavation of the hidden inside all of us. But before I get into all of that, I will finish

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All In A Day’s Work….part 2

Art & Culture, Dead Horse Records, Indonesia, Jakarta, Jazz, Music Education, Personal, Road Life, Travel / Wednesday, February 19, 2014 / 4 minutes of reading

Part two of a three part series about renewal of faith and the telling of an adventure that returned a lost heart. Mine. Let’s see where was I, ah yes….. The first day of school. IMDI- The Institut of Musik Daya Indonesia. I walked the lengthy road heading toward the school and what I cam

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All In A Day’s Work…..part 1

Art & Culture, Indonesia, Jakarta, Music, Music Education, Road Life, World Music / Monday, January 13, 2014 / 6 minutes of reading

“When traveling is made too easy and comfortable, its spiritual meaning is lost. This may be called sentimentalism, but a certain sense of loneliness engendered by traveling leads one to reflect upon the meaning of life, for life is, after all, a traveling from one unknown to another unknown.“ D.T. Suzuki (1870-1966) This posting is

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“Art for Art sake”

Art & Culture, Indonesia, Travel / Tuesday, February 5, 2013 / 3 minutes of reading

Here to report on my mini-quest to understand the “World” community and how being an “artist” fits into the grand scheme of things. People separate the “artist” community from the “everybody else” community. The artist has all types of myths shadowing their lives. Are they in it for the money or for the pure love

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Bayside Historical Society performance

Art & Culture, history, Interior design / Saturday, January 14, 2012 / 1 minute of reading

Yeah, I know it’s the last minute, but…… I’m playing a fun gig tomorrow at the beautiful Bayside Historical Society. This is the second time we’ve performed in this space. If you are out and about in Bayside, NY tomorrow afternoon, come on by and see us. Here are some more exact details: BHS Annual

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Java Jazz Festival – Indonesia take 2

Art & Culture, Indonesia, Jakarta, Jazz, Music Education, Personal, Road Life, Travel, World Music / Thursday, July 9, 2009 / 8 minutes of reading

Little did I know that the following month I would be back in Indonesia playing music with my dear friend and conducting workshops at the school. I arrived on Monday, March 2nd and it was much hotter than I remembered. I was met at the airport by a representative from the Java Jazz Festival and

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Writer’s Block

Art & Culture, Conscious Life, Michael Franks / Friday, December 19, 2003 / 2 minutes of reading

Yes, yes, it has been months. The purpose of this blog today is to make new determinations for this year and one of those is to write more blogs this year. Starting with this one. I was talking to Michael Franks about a week ago and I was adamantly promoting the wonder and beauty of

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Tokyo, Tokyo, Tokyo, Tokyo…..

Art & Culture, Michael Franks, Music, Road Life, Travel / Sunday, March 9, 2003 / 2 minutes of reading

I’m back and the trip was fantastic!!! I didn’t take any pictures, except for the one time we were at soundcheck at Sweet Basil’s and I started shooting away only to discover that I hadn’t any film in the camera. Oh well. The first five days were challenging, for I was relating to a stomach

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