JCC Conversations | Mark Braun

Learn about Mark’s adventures including putting the bike with the piano on a boat and towing it with the help of volunteer swimmers from St. Ignace to Mackinac Island.

Mr. B is a blues and boogie-woogie pianist who has become one of the premiere purveyors of a vanishing art. Having learned his craft first-hand from the early masters, he is a rare living link to the first generation of blues and boogie pianists.

JCC Conversations | Kevin Lieberman

Chuck Newman interviews Michigan Robotics PhD Candidate Kevin Lieberman. You may have enjoyed listening to Kevin playing a selection of Jewish music emanating from the Baird Carillon at Burton Memorial Tower.  They discuss his studies in human-robot interaction in aerospace, defense, and other complex environments.  He will also inquire about the international presentation on RoboEthics and Rabbis: Being Jewish During the Robot Apocalypse.

JCC Conversations | Adam Grant, Executive Director of A Brighter Way

Based in Ypsilanti, A Brighter Way empowers formerly-incarcerated individuals to return to the community to achieve purpose-filled lives. With the help and guidance of an experienced and supportive team, people find opportunity, community, and acceptance. In less than a year as the Executive Director of A Brighter Way, Adam has doubled the number of returning citizens served and maintained the organization’s record of never having any of them return to prison. His success, in part, is due to his spending 27 years in prison himself.

 

JCC Conversations | Eli Neiburger, Director of the Ann Arbor District Library

Watch this great interview with Chuck Newman and Eli Neiburger about his vision for the role that public libraries can play in the digital age. Neiburger is regarded as a visionary when it comes to the role of public libraries, and he  shares how the Ann Arbor District Library became the 7th best library system in the United States. The AADL has also been rated the best among communities the size of Ann Arbor.

 

Friends of the Sixties: John Sinclair and the Blues Scholars

"Friends of the Sixties" and host Michael Erlewine present poet and blues scholar John Sinclair backed up by the Blue Scholars doing the words from an interview of Howlin' Wolf by Michael Erlewine at the first Ann Arbor Blues Festival in 1969. The Blues Scholars include Michael Erlewine on harmonica, Seth Bernard on guitar, Luke Winslow-King on bass, with vocals by May and Anne Erlewine. Originally recorded in 2007 at the Heart Center Studios. (c) Copyright 2013 by Michael Erlewine.

The Prime Movers Blues Band (Feat. Iggy Pop): Instrumental

The legendary Prime Movers Blues Band recorded no albums. The band formed in the summer of 1965 at the same time the Grateful Dead began. Known mostly throughout the Midwest, the band did play in San Francisco during the 'Summer of Love' in 1967, opening for "Cream" at the Fillmore Auditorium, playing at The Matrix, The Straight Theater, the Avalon Ballroom, and many other venues. Recently a reel-to-reel tape was found. It is one summer night's bar gig, one complete set probably in 1966 or 1967.