Memorial Day

I have been making images of the American Flag for several years - always amazed at the many ways the flag is displayed and discussed. Here are a few thoughts on this Memorial Day.....

'I prefer a man who will burn the flag and then wrap himself in the Constitution to a man who will burn the Constitution and then wrap himself in the flag'........Anonymous Quote

'I wrote the script of Patton. I had this very bizarre opening where he stands up in front of the American Flag and gives his speech. Ultimately, I was fired. When the script was done, they hired another writer and that script was forgotten'...Francis Ford Coppola

'Martin Luther King did not carry just a piece of cloth to symbolize his belief in racial equlaity, he carried an American Flag'....Adrian Cronauer

 'There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people'......Howard Zinn

Timeless Hands

'Often while traveling with a camera we arrive just as the sun slips over the horizon of a moment, too late to expose film, only time enough to expose our hearts'......Minor White

Memorial Day

Wishing everyone a fun Memorial Day weekend.......Around here we are getting ready for dinner guests tonight - nothing like a few guests to put one in high gear doing everything that could have been done a week ago....


At any rate have some fun - be safe - see you on the other side.

Today's image is yet another from the Brooklyn Bridge series - I am considering a trip to Coney Island over the weekend - have a need to capture a bit of old New York before it disappears. And remember the Mermaid Parade is only three weeks away - Lou Reed is the King and Laurie Anderson is the Queen....the parade is quite the event culminating in the Mermaid Ball.....

Check out the links above.

The painting in the header is circa 1997.......

Johnny Winter

About all the information on this image is it was shot around 1975 at Madison Square Garden.

I do, however remember that one could use flash in those days. Albeit a bit harsh, flash allowed the viewer to clearly see what was going on at the side of the stage. There was something special about being able to sit on the side of the stage to see a show - does not happen that much these days.



On another front I received a few emails correcting my dates on the two Todd Rundgren posts. Thanks to  'Mr. Long Island' who stated that the Rundgren images were from the 'Todd" album and it was actually out in 1974.

 'The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are'.....Joseph Campbell

Bon Jovi

 
So last night I was fortunate enough to be at The Meadowlands Stadium for the opening musical event - Bon Jovi with Train at the opening act.

The new stadium is a fabulous place to see a sporting event or musical event. And, as always, Jon Bon Jovi did not let anyone down. He was simply balls to the walls for two hours fifteen minutes. If you have the opportunity go see this show - well worth it on all fronts.



Here are a few more including an IPhone look at the stadium and staging.

Todd Rundgren

I posted an image of Todd Rundgren several weeks ago that garnered several response from his various fan clubs and online blogs.

In particular props go out to Keith Milne who noted that the guitar Todd played in that image was the same one Eric Clapton used in Cream. As Keith mentions this guitar is a double cutaway Gibson SG.

Keith's reply is below:

'Here is a bit of trivia I see in that photograph -

The Gibson SG Todd is playing is the very same painted guitar that belonged to Eric Clapton from the Cream days. It is a VERY famous instrument and many replicas have been made of it. I can also tell by the color of his hair that this was probably taken around 1978 when the album "Todd" was released. The paper album liner has a photograph of Todd created from names of people who responded on a postcard included in the previous album "A Wizard, A True Star". Of course, my name appears on that liner. :)'

Hence the second Todd image today from the same outdoor concert in Central Park, New York City. This image is a reproduction from an existing print that I photographed this morning.

I really love the way music connects people even after so many years..........'confluence' comes to mind...

John Mellencamp

As you all know I was a tour manager in the music business for almost 40 years. One of the artists I worked for was John Mellencamp.

Sometime in or around August 2000  John came up with the idea for The Good Samaritan Tour, meaning we set up and played acoustic shows in various cities around the country. We carried the smallest of sound systems, and John was backed up by only two musicians who played various instruments including the fiddle....

The tour started in Philadelphia and ended in Bloomington, Indiana. Literally we just pulled into town, went to the local park, set up and played, sometimes for two hours.

After the concert in Cleveland I was waiting by the bus when I saw this amazing scene moving directly at me. Always having a camera is a good thing - I really like this image - reminds me of that time back in the 60's when protest events were happening across the country.

Death Valley

'The clearest way to the Universe is through a forest wilderness'......John Muir

My buddy Al Hernandez and I went exploring Death Valley last March and ran into Kevin Raber from Phase One who happened to be at the same hotel in Furnace Creek.

At any rate one day while we were out exploring Death Valley with Kevin we turned onto West Side Road on the backside of Badwater which is where this image appeared.

Got to run today - New York City is calling....

The image in the header is also form Death Valley...

Outakes

I was browsing through my library today looking for something to post when I saw these two images. I have always considered them outtakes at first but something keeps making me return for another look.

Today, after some post processing, I decided to put them on the blog and get some feedback.

There is surely some unconscious reasoning that keeps attracting me to religious imagery. For years I have stopped to capture images of churches, crosses, graveyards and side-of-the-road tributes to lost souls.

Maybe it has something to with disappearing America - those simple ideals that have been lost forever like a classic piece of architecture being torn down or the local mom and pop business that needs to close and make way for progress.

Maybe writing this will help me understand why I make these images.

Both of these are from route 17 that runs from Virginia down into Florida - the Route 66 of the east coast....The BBQ shot in the header is also from Route 17.

Labelle

Patti Labelle, Nona Hendryx, Sarah Dash and Cindy Birdsong were a group called 'The Ordettes' circa 1960. When Birdsong departed for the 'Supremes' in 1967 they eventually morphed into 'Labelle'.

Originally this was shot in color for Rolling Stone in 1973. I much prefer the black and white conversion.

The new header image was captured on Route 17 in Woodbine, Georgia..

Little Beach, Falmouth, MA

      Recently while in Death Valley I was totally captivated by mother nature's ability to draw, so to speak,  'lines in the sand'. If one was lucky enough to catch a stiff wind the night before the dunes would take on an entirely different persona from the day before. The footprints would disappear and the lines in the sand would form new patterns that appeared to be maps to some unknown treasure -  the actual treasure was being lucky enough to be out at sunrise to see the pristine shapes and lines that nature had bestowed on the  dunes overnight.
 

 Last weekend up on Cape Cod I had the same feelings at Little Beach located in Falmouth. Albeit I was there in the middle of the day (not the usually golden light photographers usually chase) the light created the most pleasing patterns in the wet sand just beyond the jetty that separates the bay from the ocean.

Makes one start thinking about.........

'In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks'.......John Muir


The top image is from Little Beach - the other below is from the Dunes at Stovepipe Wells, Death Valley.

Quissett Harbor

Last Saturday in Cape Cod we were rushing out to Quissett Harbor to capture the sunset. As we were running late the plan was to park and rush out to the beach ( a short hike) to get set up. The sky had the most fabulous clouds and our hopes for sunset were elevated.  However, on arrival at the parking area, the boats in the harbor were hard to pass up with the reflections from the cloudy blue sky reflecting in the still water.

The capture above is one of the boat images...

PS: We did manage to get out in time for the sunset and it was as expected. Sunset images another day.

Cape Cod

Silver Beach - just after sunrise 

Just back from three days in Cape Cod - Woods Hole - Falmouth area of the cape.

I was lucky enough to have two good friends, Debbie and Dennis, to show me around - more like driving Mr Daisy if you ask me. Debbie is a painter and Dennis is a photographer (both excellent at their craft), and, I got the benefit of their two years on the Cape as they knew every nook and cranny on the island. Apparently, and certainly not something I was aware of before this weekend, the state of Massachusetts is a strong advocate of public access - therefore I was able to see some magnificent natural beaches and wooded areas. Not to mention being able to make a few decent photographs along the way.

Short post today - just installed Snow Leopard and having so many issues - thinking about going back to 10.5.8 - nothing works and crashes everywhere...

Todd Rundgren

Found another image from the 1970's - Todd Rundgren in Central Park at Summer Stage.

Summer Stage was one of the fun New York venues every summer in Central Park. For some reason there was a large mirror that hung on the downstage end tilted down in toward the muscisians. Not quite sure but perhaps this had something to do with lighting the artists as we were still in the early days of the technical enhancements we have today. 

At any rate you can see this photographer standing in the back in a black t-shirt and jeans. Note the Pentax one degree spot meter hanging from my neck - great for determining a zone system exposure. I also counted no less then three other photographers walking around the stage - something that would never happen today.

I always said that back in the day one could never tell the artists from the audience and crew...

'True art takes note not merely of form but also of what lies behind'...Mahatma Gandhi

Roger Daltry

 After the Howard Stein post yesterday I got to thinking about some of his shows that I shot. Today's image is from Madison Square Garden, circa 1975. I believe they did a total of 5 shows in either September or November that year.

Howard Stein

OK, another one from the past, Howard Stein.

This was shot at the Academy of Music in New York, circa mid seventies. For the longest time he promoted Rock and Roll shows at The Academy of Music on east 14th street. At one point in time it was actually called Howard Stein's Academy of Music.

Finding this image brings back so many memories of the Academy of Music - the Frank Zappa Halloween shows, Frampton's Camel, Genesis when they did 'The Lamb Lies Down of Broadway with Peter Gabriel and on and on.

Howard also promoted at Carnegie Hall, did the Rolling Stones at Madison Square Garden, Janis Joplin shows, Jame Taylor, David Bowie, Rod Stewart and Cat Stevens to name a just a few. In particular I remember him promoting the Who at Madison Square Garden in 1975....He also started the nightclub Xenon around 1978.

I first met Howard when I used to hang at the Academy of Music and photograph from the pit night after night. There were different rules back then and you could actually shoot the entire show, never leaving the pit except for the rest rooms.

Howard passed away last year so for me this is a fitting tribute to a man I knew and respected during those hectic early years. He gave back more then he took and for me that is the true mark of a man......

Video Still

 Still rummaging through the boxes of film that have been sitting dormant for almost 15 -20 years.

This image  is John Mellencamp's band  from a video shoot for the 1993 CD 'Human Wheels'.

Only about 10,000 more images to work through....

Opera Singers

After several months of on and off testing, I finally am able to make decent scans at home. At a workshop several weeks ago I was told to set the unsharp masking to -120. Now I would ask how  anyone could have figured this out - except for the fact that it works brilliantly.

Yesterday I was doing some catalog work with my film archives and I found the image above. Best I can remember is they were Opera Singers - I believe they were mother and son. This image was taken in the early 70's for Zoo World Magazine based out of Florida.

If  anyone might know who these people are please get in contact with me. 

'No matter how slow the film, Spirit always stands still long enough for the photographer It has chosen'....Minor White

'Sharon Jones' and the 'Dap Kings'

This past Saturday night it was a trip to the Apollo Theater on 125th Street in Harlem. The act was Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings.  After three albums and 10 years they are an overnight sensation.  For the obvious reasons seeing this show at the Apollo was completely appropriate.

Let me just say that if you have not caught this act put it on your bucket list. Sharon Jones is a combination of the great funk-soul singers of years gone by.  Names like Mavis Staples, James Brown, Aretha Franklin and Tina Turner come to mind.

Sharon and the 18 piece band put on a fabulous show. Everyone in that band are top level A team players. Sharon and the Kings do a soulful version of Woody Guthrie's "This Land is Your Land' which had the entire audience up and dancing - rocking the Apollo....

Great live act - check them out if you can.