Seven Point Sunday #1 – March 22, 2021

by | Mar 22, 2021

I’m starting a newsletter. Yeah, like for real. Straight from my keyboard to your inbox.
 
There’s something about this that feels both old and new. Newsletters (and newsgroups) were some of the first online communities. And now they’re coming back, as several social media platforms are letting their users create newsletters to communicate directly with their audiences. Sure, I post to Facebook, IG, Twitter – but it’s hard to know who is seeing what, as the respective algorithms limit the organic reach of posts.
 
So, we’re back to good ole fashioned email. I’ve been meaning to do this for a while, and it’s taken me a year into the pandemic to finally set this up.
 
What will I cover in this newsletter? A bit of everything: personal development, productivity, business, investments, politics, music, films. While that may seem “all over the place,” I hope my curiosity will be of interest to you, and we may grow together. I’ll also provide updates on my projects: music I’m making, books and articles that I’m writing, films I’m producing. This newsletter will evolve and find its own groove. I hope that you enjoy my missives and that you encourage your friends to read and subscribe.
 
The Lede
My opera just came out!
Angela’s Ring: An Opera Revue of the European Debt Crisis
Listen here
 

My friend Michelle Caruso-Cabrera was a CNBC news anchor who performs on the opera. She’s also running for Comptroller of New York City.

 
Opera Reviews:
  • The Jazz Owl: “It is not very often that we see a Jazz opera and rarer still to hear a work of Jazz and Classical vocals that is so instructive, humorous, and sympathetic to an international crisis, but Angela’s Ring is all of that.”
  • Take Effect: “But if your interests reside anywhere near opera and jazz, there’s much in the way of instruments, texturing and top notch songwriting to be excited about from the exceptional talent present.”
  • Midwest Record: “The script is pretty funny and sassy–you don’t even have to be a news head to smirk your way through it…Don’t be afraid to approach it if you want something new that really colors outside the lines.”

Nota Bene

My long time creative partner Arturo O’Farrill won a Grammy Award for Best Latin Jazz Album for his album Four Questions which is inspired by the wisdom of W. E. B. DuBois. I was blessed to help produce the album. Listen here.
 
Here’s what I wrote in the liner notes:
Four Questions is the sixth production on which Arturo and I collaborated, over almost a decade. It’s been amazing to see Arturo’s journey as an artist and intellect. He makes music that is both contemporary and timeless, provoking questions among listeners to observe their surroundings. That this project is grounded in the philosophy of one great American writer, W.E.B. Du Bois, it’s fitting to cite another. The influential African American jazz critic and novelist Albert Murray believed that cultural diversity was a hallmark to America’s strength, and I know that Arturo believes this, too. Moreover, like Murray, Arturo believes that the powers that be should be called out for intolerance and bigotry.

 

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