Doctor Sax and the Great World Snake

March 10, 2018Simon Pettet

Doctor Sax and The Great World Snake – In honor of Jack Kerouac’s 96th birthday (coming up on Monday) – we present Jim Sampas‘ version of his uncle’s original screenplay, featuring the voices of Robert Creeley, Jim Carroll, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and a host of talented others.

The double-disc CD of a reading of this initially-lost text (with a newly-commissioned score by John Medeski, and an accompanying book with illustrations by Richard Sala) was released back in 2003

Here‘s the announcement in Rolling Stone

Here‘s a transcript of  NPR’s Bob Edwards, talking to Jim Sampas

A … Read More

July 12, 1995 – Part Two (Sikelianos, Waldman, Carroll)

July 13, 2017Simon Pettet

Continuing from yesterday

This second part of the reading begins with Eleni Sikelianos

[Eleni Sikelianos, photo:  Maria Garcia-Teutsch]

Max Regan: “Eleni Sikelianos is the author of To Speak While Dreaming, published in 1993 by Salva Editions . She’s also the recipient of a California Arts Council Residency grant in San Francisco where she teaches writing to children and the homeless and at the San Francosco Art Institute. She has work appearing in Japan, has been translated into French, and will be published in France this Fall. She recently recieved the Gertrude Stein Award for Innovative American Writing… Read More

Jim Carroll Workshop Q & A – 9 ( Lou Reed) – (Conclusion)

September 5, 2016admin
Jim Carroll (1949-2009)
 
We’ve been running these past week’s transcription of Jim Carroll’s 1986 Naropa workshop  (see most recently here and here) . We continue today and conclude with the second part of the Q & A
 
Student: Another question here
Jim Carroll:  Yeah, Oh, great
Student: Do you still worry about a regular rhyme-scheme?
Anne Waldman:  Louder!
JC: He just asked me how much I worry about a regular rhyme-scheme – I do think about rhymes because.. whereas I don’t in poems. I think I use.. In Living At The Movies, I, like,
… Read More

Jim Carroll Workshop – 8 – Q & A (Power Chords)

September 4, 2016admin
Allen Ginsberg and Jim Carroll from The Love Book by Rob Rosenheck]]
Continuing with Jim Carroll’s June 30 1986 Naropa Poetics and Music class, we now turn to the Q & A:
Jim Carroll: I should say, like.. I mean.. just… does anybody, like, have any questions about, anything?  (But), like, I’m thinking about the nature of.. I obviously ask about.. the nature of the difference between lyrics and poems, generally, but.. you know, that’s not important to.. (go further into) (We can) talk about that next time. What? Allen?  [Allen puts up his hand to ask a
… Read More

Jim Carroll Workshop – 7 (American Express and Shape Shifter)

September 3, 2016admin
Jim Carroll’s songwriting workshop continues
See here. here, here, here  here, and here
JC: It [“Sherlock Holmes“] – has a real long fade I don’t want to subject you to it, you know…. But this one is a regular…this is not the same song now  – obviously, but this is called… no.. wait a minute.. this is called…”Shake”? – no, this is called “American Express“.
This is a better mix, it’s an engineer mix, and I think
… Read More

Jim Carroll workshop – continues – 6

August 28, 2016admin

[Sherlock Holmes – illustration by Sidney Paget]

transcription of Jim Carroll’s 1986 Naropa workshop continues

JC: Now I’m going to play this..

(JC: here, can you cue this up? first song on Side A – Student: Sure)

This is some of the stuff. I shouldn’t really play this either, but this is the stuff with a couple of new songs I wrote with me and (Ray) Manzarek – I think this one’s called.. This is a real rough mix. I made.. I had the engineer make it while the guitar guy was doing his lead lines.. so.. I … Read More

Jim Carroll Workshop – 5 (Patti Smith)

August 27, 2016admin

[Patti Smith and Jim Carroll c 1969 – Photograph by Wren D”Antonio]

Jim Carroll’s June 30, 1986 Naropa Poetics and Music Workshop contimues – see previous segments – here. here, here and here

JC: Then, you know, the danger of course being, you didn’t want to fall into that kind of stream-of-consciousness type of scene because, I mean, that falls into a certain lassitude too easily also. So you have to use a song structure, I think. You can’t just put a poem to music. That’s very difficult, you know. I think with every song by this young … Read More

Jim Carroll workshop continues – 4

August 21, 2016admin

Jim Carroll workshop continues – see here, here and here

JC: I mean, that just has..you know. Like, I mentioned before about Henry Miller – the one book.. when they ask(ed) me what books people should read for this course, I mention(ed) the Henry Miller book, (The) Time of the Assasins, because, I mean, simply because it made me feel like.. That was he book that made me want to get into music, you know. I read..

I mean, it’s his assessment of Rimbaud – it’s really just as much his assessment of Henry Miller, of course … Read More

Jim Carroll workshop continues – 3 – (Bob Dylan)

August 20, 2016admin

This weekend, following on from last weekend, transcription of the 1980 Jim Carroll music and poetics workshop at Naropa continues. For the two previous segments – see here and here

JC: And also I mean, like, people, eventually, knew where his [Bob Dylan‘s] influences were coming from, whereas they didn’t know where Lou (Reed)’s influences were coming from. Not as many people had read Delmore Schwartz as Allen Ginsberg and Rimbaud. And so, I don’t know, there were certain songs of Dylan’s which just got…I lost faith in, for a while, you know. And then I … Read More

Jim Carroll Workshop – 2

August 14, 2016admin

continuing from yesterday – Jim Carroll’s workshop 

JC: Well, I’m going to play a song that was a great..  one of my favorites… ..Actually, I’m going to play this early Velvet Underground song and then I’m going to play a Phil Ochs song. For some reason, Phil Ochs and The Velvet Underground have this weird connection for me. I mean. they got me into poetry as much as Bob.. well more than Bob Dylan, and as much as Frank O’Hara
[Student/technical assistant plays The Velvet Underground’s “Sunday Morning” – JC: “Yeah go ahead..just turn it up here” – Student: The … Read More