Audio by Adam

For most Americans, the Thanksgiving feast means a traditional turkey feast with family and friends, and a moment’s pause to feel and express gratitude for the gifts life has given them, even during tough times. I took to the streets of New York to talk to people about what they are grateful for, and why.

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Every year, upwards of 700 Mormons take over the hill in upstate New York where they believe their founder, Joseph Smith, discovered the golden tablets making up the Book of Mormon. They reenact the history of the world and the history of their people on into the Future in ‘them thar hills,’ and believe me, it is both strange and impressive, even for “Gentiles” like me. Here is my sound-soaked report about it from a few years back.

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The witch has come in for some pretty hard knocks in previous centuries, but lately there has been a resurgence of interest in what she has to offer both as a way of seeing, and a way of being that is female, strong, earthy, connected and wise. This is a half hour documentary that explores witchcraft in all its wholesomeness and mystery. Appearances by Z. Budapest, Starhawk, Gina Banghart, Matthew Fox, Joseph Campbell and many others. Come on in! The magick’s fine!

(Also of interest: my NPR long form documentary “The Goddess in the USA” )

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In which Adam explores the biological and the spiritual pull toward the great “Out There” through interviews with an astronaut, Terence McKenna, astophysicists, and many others.  Cameo appearance by his son Noah as an infant.

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Even given its colonial past and present day kitsch, Hawaii remains both an earthly paradise and a place of natural numinous power.  This is evident in its variety of spiritual musical idioms. Here is a taste of some of them,culled from a Smithsonian Festival a few years back.  Aloha!

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It may be hard or many of us to imagine the glitter and the sometimes risque fun associated with the old nightclubs, burlesques and vaudeville houses of the 1920s and 1930s, especially in New York, where such entertainment reached a certain height of glamor. But what was that life like for those on the other side of the footlights? For this piece, I spoke with the late Dorshka Rafaelson, formerly of the Ziegfeld Follies, and Isabelle Powell,  widow of Adam Clayton Powell, who graced Harlem’s Cotton Club.  Both were  still-beautiful, and beautifully spirited, women.

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Forty years after Woodstock, the iconic music festival still looms large in the public mind as the high point — or, some say, the death knell — of America’s 1960s’ counterculture. What was it like to be there for “veteran” audience members and performers, and what is the legacy of this unique cultural happening?   Adam went tripping for some answers.

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A collection of music produced by Yo-Yo Ma in connection with the winter holiday season, which exemplifies his wide-ranging and talented musical family – including traditional and modern and world music arrangements from the USA,  Brazil, medieval Ireland and closer to home.  Yo-Yo Ma is his normal charming, charismatic and virtuosic self.

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Every year, hundreds, or even thousands of talented young people come to New York to study, audition and do their damnedest to make it big on the stage whose ultimate Holy Grail is Broadway.  In this story, I speak to some of these starry-eyed youth as they prepare for the Big Time in Musical Theater school, rehearsal and beyond.  Go for it!

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