Sparks from the Fire

Note: It’s been a month since my last post.  That’s my first pause of its kind in nearly five years of writing this blog.  Sometimes ya’ just got to refuel, I guess.  I didn’t plan it; it just happened, but I’m back.  Thanks for your patience and understanding.

Poem by Peter Link

You can’t sell imagination in jars.
So what?
It’s already ours.

You can’t buy it in a box
Or learn it in the school of hard knocks

You won’t find it in the attic
Or in any way limited to just the aristocratic
Nor is it in any way idiosyncratic
It’s just a blessing to us all

Call it a gift from God
A flight of fancy
The quixotic muse of the heart
The mythic invention of wishful thinking
A fantastical work of art

An ingenious moment of genius
The conceive of make-believe
The romance that burns between yus
The extravagant dream we weave

Michaelangelo, the sculptor
Really got it right
He looked beyond the eyes
Beyond what the eyes could see
He saw the angel in the marble
And carved until he set her free.

Imagination was the key
And the door opened wide
To the treasures of the mind
That lie inside

Imagination!
Mind’s eye to the world of make-believe
The most wondrous of inventions
Designed to make the world believe
What we perceive

Imagination!
The rising of the curtain
On creative mind
The visionary’s chance
To define the undefined
And leave the world of physicality behind

Imagination …
The chance to stand in God’s shoes
And schmooze with the Muse
And fabricate a world
Out of nothing

As a writer, which includes this blog and all my musical composition, I consider myself a bridge.  What is a bridge?  Google defines: “A structure that allows people or vehicles to cross an obstacle such as a river or canal …”

I’m interested in the obstacles that we all face in this partly human experience on Planet Earth and the crossing thereof.  The verb definition is most interesting to me: “To connect or reduce the distance between”.  That’s my goal – to reduce the distance between this human existence (mortality) and my spiritual completeness (spirituality).  To reduce it to nothing.

Many writers just write about the human experience.  The New York Times best-seller list is fill of these author’s works.

Many others write about their visions of the spiritual world and work with mostly immaculate ideas.

Both have their relevance and necessity.

I choose to work the middle ground.  It is my interest to both discover and then provide a bridge from one world to the next.  No matter how lofty my thought, no matter how impeccably I sometimes see the pure, spiritual Peter Link, I still find myself under the covers in bed the next morning waking up to life on Planet Earth.  As long as I keep doing this, I’m going to keep trying to find that bridge – and I’m going to keep writing about it.

And so my songs do not illuminate only pure and perfect worlds.  I write about the obstacles that we all face in getting there.  I try to write about the human condition approaching the divine.  That’s what fascinates me because that’s where I’m at.  I sometimes sense the divine in my life; I am sometimes touched by the divine, but I just don’t live there consistently quite yet.  After all, I live in New York City, two blocks from Times Square – a very complex and wide variety of existence.

I also live in my studio, in a most wondrously creative world surrounded by complex material technology that helps me immeasurably to express my thoughts, discoveries and feelings.  It is definitely a mixture of the material and the spiritual and in every working hour I’m looking for that bridge.  There are rough moments when I think I’m running out of time.  And then there are timeless moments when there is no time and I’m lost (strange word) in the wondrous world of creativity.

I like to tell the truth as I see it.  It’s my particular corner on life.  Perhaps it can illuminate a thought or two for you?  Perhaps it will ruffle your feathers.

And make you think … (more…)

Two bro’

Note: The following is Part 3 of a 4 part series written especially for my close family.  It is pretty personal stuff, but, in retrospect, eminently shareable with this readership family

When I had graduated from college, moved to New York City and had some early success in show business, I lived alone, a bachelor.  Every Christmas for 5-6 years I would go spend the holiday season with Jim and his family in St. Louis.  Mom and Dad lived there as well, but it was Jim’s house that I stayed in.  He had three of the sharpest kids I have ever laid eyes on – Cindy, Tina and a little red-headed ball-buster named Travis.  In those years I became the Jim to Travis’s Pete – except that I was about 25 years older than Travis rather than 5.

Jim, Travis, Tina, Pete, Cindy

We had a love/hate relationship that usually ended up with Travis going to his mom crying, but he too just could not turn from the opportunity to try to wallop Unca Pete.  Sometimes he would crawl up on the bed and wake me up with a slug to the nose or the closed eye.  Ouch!  Anyone who has ever raised a 5-year old knows that their punch can really hurt.  Sometimes I would hear him coming and just as he reared back to let one loose, I would wake up and scream “AAAAHHH” and scare him half to death so that he would run crying to Mom.

Those Christmases became the iconic Christmases for me because they were my way of hanging on to my own childhood and playing with those beautiful children that I had fallen so in love with.  Jim and I would stay up till 4 or 5 o’clock every Christmas Eve wrapping presents for the kids and often talking about our own childhood Christmases and the great times we had together as kids.  Whenever we would tell stories of when we were kids to his kids; they would gather around wide-eyed and fully concentrated, excited to hear about when we were like them.  These were their favorite stories and we had to tell them over and over.

Christmas Eve Preparation

For the next 30 years or so, Jim, the accountant, did my taxes for free each year and advised me how to take my proper deductions, organize my business life, steer clear of shady deals and stay on top of my roller coaster financial life in show biz.  One thing you can say about show biz:  It is not financially consistent.  I never had a real consistent  job until Watchfire Music.  I never knew where the next job was coming from, and yet I’m proud to say that I never had to work at any other job besides making music.  That one thing is a success story in itself in this business.  But it is an up and down life – like most entrepreneurs. (more…)

The Aladdin Hotel – Las Vegas – Yikes!

This is Part 9 of a multi-part series of posts.  I suggest that you start with Part 1 if you have the time and really want to appreciate the full effulgence.

Epilogue to Iphigenia:
One day, around five years later, I received a telephone call from Ralph Alswang, a prominent theater designer, who told me of a national contest for The Best Rock Opera being staged by the Aladdin Theater for the Performing Arts in Las Vegas.  They were just completing a new 7500-seat theater at the Aladdin Hotel in Vegas and the show winner of the contest would receive at least a year contract running nightly in Vegas,

I laughed at the thought of Iphigenia, a Euripidean classic and Greek tragedy to boot, in Vegas, but after he explained that if I won, it would make me a rich man for life since I was the sole owner of the piece and would receive 5% of the gross, I reconsidered the strange idea.  My lawyer felt that it would not be a bad move at all.  Lawyers well understand the dollar signs.

Ralph Alswang, having seen Iphigenia at The Public Theater, felt that I actually might have a pretty good chance of winning it if I were to submit.

To make a long story short, I took a couple of weeks and reworked a new draft of the piece with Ralph’s suggestion that Iphigenia become one performer (instead of 12) with a large 40 voice chorus of women around her.

We also renamed the piece, Masquerade.  To this day I have no idea what that title meant and what it had to do with Euripides’ play.

I was flown to Vegas, pitched and sang the idea to a bunch of Italian-type business-men in suits and won the contest. (more…)

Madge Sinclair and Girls

This is Part 8 of a multi-part series of posts.  I suggest that you start with Part 1 if you have the time and really want to appreciate the full effulgence.

The New York Opening:

We went to London a nervous group of apprehensive American performers hoping to receive some sort of nod from the English masters of classical theater with our experimental rock opera based on a famous Greek tragedy and came home swaggering with a hit show.

The people of London ‘got it’.  Even the critics ‘got it’.  The critics, with their well-written reviews has pointed us in several directions that we wanted to fix before opening in NYC, so our producer, Joe Papp, once again put us back into rehearsal – this time for a month.  Doug Dyer, our wild, avant-garde Texas director was full of new ideas far too exotic to even attempt in that short period of time.  What we needed was to have the rough stone polished to a high gloss.

Unfortunately, we wasted two of the weeks trying some of Doug’s ideas and finally, a frustrated Joe fired director Doug and brought in Gerald Friedman to direct and work with our brilliant young choreographer, Lar Lubovitch. Gerald was the guy he should have brought in as soon as we got back from London.  He was an experienced Broadway professional who really knew the theater.

One of the biggest disappointments was that neither Joe nor Gerald had seen the show at its best in London and though the hearsay was excellent, neither had a strong sense of how well it had worked for the audiences.  Nonetheless, Gerald went to work in the two weeks remaining and did wonders cleaning up and polishing the show and readying it for the NY critics.

The Achilles character was cut and Iphigenia’s potential husband was only talked or sung about.  What worked was the music and the girls and Clytemnestra (Madge Sinclair) and Agamemnon (Manu Topou) were strong classical performers with the size to match our Iphigenia of twelve.

We went into NY previews with an even better show than in London with the additions, deletions and savvy corrections of our new director.  Oh how I wished he had had the chance to work on the piece longer, for his work was smart, sharp and just what the piece needed.

Previews were a smash.  The audiences went wild every night and Joe was most excited to present NYC with still another big hit show.  But Gerald and I were wary.  In New York, in the 70s, you had to get the NY Times critic to love you or else you would never have a true hit.  Without The Times rave review, you wouldn’t have a blockbuster. (more…)

Les Girls of Iphigenia

This is Part 7 of a multi-part series of posts.  I suggest that you start with Part 1 if you have the time and really want to appreciate the full effulgence.

Les Girls of Iphigenia:

Twelve young starlets play one classic role in the same opera.  Twelve variations of the same young girl facing her death at the hands of her father all in the service of her country.  We wondered if it would work, if the audiences would ‘get it’.  They had no trouble with the concept and the musical/rock opera rode on the giant wings of these twelve amazingly talented women in every performance.

How I loved these women!  Twelve of the top talents in NYC to work with, to write for, to arrange for.  It was a composer’s dream come true.

Over the couple of years of the run, first in workshops in NYC, then in London and then again in performances back in NYC, there were a number of other women who came in and out – understudies, swings and replacements, (Broadway star Patti Lupone was one) but the core twelve were something special and over the years, after the run of the show, I had the gratifying opportunity to watch nearly every one of them blossom into a star on a major scale.

Jullianne

Julianne — Julianne Marshall was our rock.  She was there for the entire run of the show and I can’t remember that she ever missed a performance.  She was a beautiful presence on stage, one of the quieter side of Iphigenia, but the leader of the kettle drum choir – six of the twelve learned to play timpani and would erupt periodically throughout the show in a grand tattoo of rhythmic pounding which represented the war around them.  Julianne would radically change in an instant from demure to powerful when she got those mallets in her hands.

Nell

Nell – Nell Carter was our trumpet.  With a voice that would cut diamonds and shatter glass she was a tremendous presence.  There were moments when I could put Nell on the melody and everybody else on the harmonies and Nell’s voice would still cut through the other eleven and state the theme.  And she was funny – probably our one true comic relief in the cast – with her wide body and her crazy spirit, she could have handled the role by herself in another production.

Nell in Ain’t Misbehavin’

Nell went on to win a Tony Award for her performance in the Broadway musical Ain’t Misbehavin’, as well as an Emmy Award for her reprisal of the role on television.

She also received Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for her starring role in the long-running 1980s’ sitcom Gimme a Break!.

Sharon

Sharon – Sharon Redd was simply beautiful and talented.  She had the fire and had one of those classic R&B voices that you heard on the radio.  Often it was Sharon, singing on commercials, as one of Bette Midler’s Harlettes and finally having a most successful career as a background vocalist, most notably with the group Soirée, which also included among its members Luther Vandross and Jocelyn Brown.

Trish – Trish Hawkins was the vulnerable side of Iphigenia.  Trish always felt to me like a fresh breath of air from the country.  She was the strongest actress of the group and, consequently, the turn-to girl that handled most of the spoken lines.  I secretly fell in love with her in the course of the run because of her natural beauty and great presence.

Trish with Judd-Hirsch

Later in life she became Lanford Wilson’s female lead in his Pulitzer Prize winning Broadway play Talley’s Folly, as well as his Broadway plays The Happy Hooker and Fifth of July.

Marion

Marion – Marion Ramsey was the energy!  Here was a blast-‘em-through-the-roof R&B/Gospel singer with serious chops and the great ability to get the audience standin’ up and clappin’.  Her big number was a song called Gate Tender which never failed to bring the house down.

Marion in Police Academy

She seemed always happy and ready for a laugh and was one of the most popular among the girls. She was later a regular on the TV series Cos but is best known for her role as the timid Officer Laverne Hooks in the Police Academy movies.

Pamela

Pam – Pamela Pentony was our Janis Joplin.  The music of the show covered many pop genres and Pam’s number, I Wonder, was a screamin’ gut wrenching rock n’ roll moment that she just tore up every night.  One wondered how she could sing like that whiskey-voiced and rockin’ and rollin’ night after night.  How could her voice possibly hold out?  But it did – 8 performances a week for a couple of years.  Pam was special.  Everybody loved her because she gave it everything she had night after night, night after night … (more…)

Bonnie Guidry, Linda Lawley, Marion Ramsey, Pamela Pentony

This is Part 6 of a multi-part series of posts.  I suggest that you start with Part 1 if you have the time and really want to appreciate the full effulgence.

London:

The plane ride to London was a blast.  An excited cast of twenty some gorgeous theatricals hangin’ over the seats, yellin’ and laughin’ back and forth and so excited about flyin’ to London.

I always kept my guitar in the overhead when I traveled and at one point I took it out and we serenaded the passengers for about a half hour with songs from the show.  At one point half the ladies were struttin’ up and down the aisle singin’ and doin’ their makeshift choreography to a bewildered, but totally entertained and enthralled audience of passengers.

A number of those people on that flight even came to see the show and came backstage afterwards to reminisce about that memorable flight.  Two months later on the flight back to NYC everyone slept the whole way home.

Theater in London is a whole different world than in the U.S.  There, there is history – a rich deep culture to draw from that the people – especially London’s theater lovers – are proud of and most knowledgeable.  After all we were now doing our classic show in the home city of one Will Shakespeare and this was a fact that meant so much to all the members of our cast.

Also at the time, Vanessa Redgrave was largely considered to be the leading actress in the Western world and everyone knew she lived in London, and on top of that her pictures adorned the walls of the Old Vic where she had starred in many of their productions.  So the girls were always a-buzz about Vanessa this and Vanessa that.

There was also some nervous speculation by all of us Americans as to how our show would be accepted in London, this great city of culture and theatrical history.  Would they put us down for being American and trivial?  Would they castigate us for turning Euripides masterpiece into a rock opera?  Would they turn up their British noses to us? (more…)

This is Part 5 of a multi-part series of posts.  I suggest that you start with Part 1 if you have the time and really want to appreciate the full effulgence.

 Casting:

The casting of Iphigenia would be problematic because Doug Dyer, the director, and I had decided that only three people could speak in the piece – Agamemnon, played by Manu Topou who had played the king in the movie “Hawaii” that at the time was so popular, Clytemnestra, played by Madge Sinclair, who you might remember from long-running stint in the 1980s as nurse Ernestine Shoop on the series Trapper John, M.D. opposite Pernell Roberts.  She received three Emmy nominations for her work on that show, or perhaps in 1988, she played Queen Aoleon opposite James Earl Jones‘ King Jaffe Joffer in the Eddie Murphy comedy Coming to America.  Achilles was first played by a young Tommy Lee Jones.

All three were classically trained actors, perfect for the roles and would not sing in the show, but would handle the minimal Euripidean dialogue with aplomb.

The tough casting choice, however, was Iphigenia.  She would have to be a young, beautiful rock/pop/folk singer with powerful acting chops and she would have minimal dialogue, but a tremendous role to sing.  And we wanted a real authentic rock n’ roller – not some theater chick who thought she was hip enough to do it.  We also needed to cast 12 ladies in waiting to be the Greek chorus.

We saw some wonderful talent.  In that day everyone wanted to work at The Public, so the turnout was fantastic.  We easily cast our Greek chorus with 12 of the top twenty-something ladies in NYC.  I was absolutely thrilled with the potential of that chorus and could not wait to get into rehearsal.

But we could not find our Iphigenia.

Finally Joe Papp told us to go into rehearsal without our leading lady for he suspected that she would emerge in the course of our rehearsals from our wondrous chorus.  When Joe said it; you did it, and so that’s what we did.

In the first week of rehearsals I taught only the music.  At the end of each day Doug, Joe and I would meet and discuss our leading candidate for our starring role based on who had been our favorite that day.  And at the end of each day we had a different choice.  By the end of the week we were no further in casting our lead than we were on the first day of rehearsal.  Then Joe had a fascinating idea. (more…)