Youmoved to Milwaukee from Minneapolis?
I came here for UWM,initially because of the finger-style guitar program. Its director, JohnStropes, says it might be the only program of its kind in the world. It’scertainly the first.
Whatdrew you to that style of music?
It was the complexity ofit. I had naively thought I had completed all the different aspects of guitarbefore discovering finger-style. Eight years later, I realize that playingguitar is more complex than I ever thought it was.
Whatdo you derive emotionally from this music?
Nothing. I don’t getanything from it anymore. I like playing rock a whole lot more.
Doyou have a band?
Yes, it’s called SonRock Man. We play unconsciously informed rock music. It’s all original songs by[guitarist] Tom Cramer and Ian anarchistic collaborative/cooperative endeavor.Our ideas are brought to the group and mixed around in a big bowl. Sometimes itturns out like a salad or a soup or a pilaf.
Describethe music.
It’s polyphonic rockwith multiple voices going oneach one independent but contributing to thesonic whole.
Hasthe band debuted?
No, sadly. We’re waitingfor two more songs.
Andwhat about your finger-style studies?
I discovered the realreason I came to Milwaukee, which was scholarship in American vernacular music.[Lecturer] Martin Jack Rosenblum was a major factor. I had a revelation in hisAmerican folk and popular music class. I’d been doing research on music foryears, attempting to figure it out, and here was somebody thinking about musicthe same way I was.
IsThreeDifferent Stairs/At the Blue Pavement Special your first poetry chapbook?
I’ve done other ones,but this one is the winethe others were only bits of cork.
Describeyour poetry.
I see myself as a poetof silence. There’s a fantastic phenomenon during certain kinds of writing,where so many things are being said that nothing is being said. Silence is theperfection.
Wherecan people get your book?
It’s exclusivelyavailable through personal contact with mewithin a four-block radius of theNo. 30 bus line.
