Anyone remember the “The Howl UltraRun”? – “The Howl UltraRun” was designed and first attempted, back in 2019, by Todd Aydelotte, a New York City race director and ultrarunner – a 91.5 mile journey across New Jersey and New York City, orchestrated around a number of key Beat sites, key locations, in the life of Allen Ginsberg.
In 2019 Aydelotte tried to run the route solo, but had to drop out after approximately 40 miles when a vicious Nor’easter made it literally impossible to continue – but we’re thrilled to announce – he”s back!
For this second attempt, scheduled for next month (October 4-6), he has invited, this time, four top East Coast UltraRunners to join him – Michael ‘Gagz’ Gagliardi, Eddie Gieda III, Michelle Goldberg and Michael Koehler
While completing the distance, the athletes will listen to audio tapes of Allen reading, singing, and chanting Buddhist mantras in “an interactive running experience, which seeks to plunge the athletes into a heightened state of consciousness”
As Aydlotte explains: “The idea here is to break our bodies so that our minds open..We’re combining long miles, poetry and spiritual focus to tap into the vibe that drove Allen and Beats, and changed the world.”
The Howl UltraRun will start at midnight, October 4th, at the poet’s grave-site in Newark, New Jersey, and will conclude with a ceremony and meditation at the flowering dogwood tree planted in his honor in the churchyard of St Marks-in-the-Bowery
We’ll keep you posted.
We mentioned a few weeks back the belated vinyl release of The Fall of America tribute album. What perhaps isn’t sufficiently well-known and is worth re-iterating is that it comes with an additional bonus track (a free download) – of Youth (Martin Glover)’s extraordinary realization of Allen’s long poem “Iron Horse” (not actually included in Fall of America, it was published independently, but is very much part of the Fall of America 1965-71 poem cycle)
Check out our bandcamp page – here
John Coltrane‘s birthday today – see John Coltrane on The Allen Ginsberg Project here, here and here