Vinx
Dreamsicle
Primal Pop. That’s the way Vinx De’Jon Parrette describes his music. Best known simply as Vinx, he combines a smooth, romantic vocal style of yesteryear with a contemporary, creative sound. He’s also a professor at the Berklee College of Music in Boston and leads workshops at his home for singers and songwriters. Sting has declared Vinx a “rare talent.”
It’s a great time to be a Philip Glass fan—last year was the composer’s 75th birthday, and special performances were held worldwide. The Philip Glass ensemble performed Glass’s score for the 1931 silent film Dracula under the stars and redwoods at Big Sur’s Henry Miller Memorial Library. And Glass’s five-hour opera Einstein on the Beach was performed for the first time in 20 years.
Paul Sutherland: You’ve been incredibly supportive of your dad. How do you see your role in his career?
The music business in Los Angeles is not known for being easy.
Bhakti-hop innovator MC Yogi travels to India for an unwitting spiritual chiropractic adjustment—and artistic inspiration for his newest musical offering.
I’m sitting cross-legged on a downtown sidewalk. My five year-old son is in my lap and for 10 minutes the little guy is completely focused and very still; we’re watching and listening with curious eyes and ears to an unusual music performance.
I’m reclining on a couch with large, cushy black pillows. Just relaxing. And listening. Live acoustic guitar music provides a perfect soundtrack for the magical view I have beyond the wide picture windows. In the distance, the shimmering blue Pacific Ocean spreads across to Monterey. Does it get any better than a midsummer evening house concert in California?
Music has always been a way to get in touch with emotion, nature, and inner stillness. And who better to choose a compilation of songs to promote relaxed presence than Eckhart Tolle? The author of The Power of Now and a globally established spiritual teacher, Tolle writes in his liner notes, “Each piece is eminently suitable for reducing or eliminating the activity of thought in you, the listener.”
Margaret Mead once said, “A small group of thoughtful people could change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” These artists represent a personal and political courage that has contributed to social justice.
Billie Holiday, “Strange Fruit” (1939)
Soundscape, audio collage, musique concrète, found sound. Those are some of the ways to describe the avant-garde traditions that Heiner Goebbels has drawn upon in his career. For his latest release, Stifters Dinge (Stifter’s Things), one might add “documentary music” to the descriptors, as this hour-long piece highlights the growing pains of a species―human beings―in a constantly changing environment. Like Apollo (above), the music was designed to accompany a live performance.
