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April 17, 2024 Stevie Van Zandt took to his social-media today to announce officially that the documentary film Stevie Van Zandt: Disciple will have its world premiere at the 2024 Tribeca Film Festival on Saturday, June 8. As per what Van Zandt and the Tribeca Film Festival shared online, the film, clocking in at just under two-and-a-half hours, will follow his life and work "as a musician, activist and actor from the clubs of Asbury Park, NJ, to stadiums around the world, to the Bada Bing Club, and beyond. Featuring Bruce Springsteen, Paul McCartney, Eddie Vedder, Bono, Maureen Van Zandt, Darlene Love, and many more." Of course Stevie also tweeted, "I hope it has a happy ending!" Stevie Van Zandt: Disciple was directed by Bill Teck, and produced by David Fisher (who also handled the film's cinematography) and Robert Cotto. It is being distributed in the U.S. by HBO Documentary Films, making it very likely that HBO/Max subscribers can expect access to the film at some point in the near future. Stay tuned for more details on Stevie Van Zandt: Disciple as they become available.

April 14, 2024 While The Bruce Springsteen Archives and Center for American Music at Monmouth University (BSACAM)'s biggest event scheduled for this month remains, of course, The 2024 American Music Honors, the Archives also is offering two free author conversation/lecture events in April, one online and one in-person at Monmouth University. Here are details on both events, including information on how to register and/or get your ticket to attend in person, free of charge: First up, online this coming Thursday, April 18 beginning at 7pm ET, is the continuation of the Archives' monthly Conversations with our Curator series. This month, BSACAM Curator Melissa Ziobro will be in conversation online with Jim Cullen, author of the books Bridge and Tunnel Boys: Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, and the Metropolitan Sound of the American Century (2023) and Born in the U.S.A.: Bruce Springsteen in American Life (2024, 3rd revised/updated edition.) Use the QR code below or click here to register to attend online, free of charge. And on the evening of Thursday April 25, the day after the 2024 American Music Honors event, the Archives will present its first annual "President’s Lecture on Music History and Contemporary America." As per the official announcement/flyer, "Hosted by Monmouth University President and BSACAM Board of Directors Chair Patrick F. Leahy, this inaugural event will highlight how music history can inform our understanding of the world we live in today...The inaugural event will feature The New York Times’ best-selling author and acclaimed historian Douglas Brinkley, who will present 'Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology): Long Sixties Protest Music and the Earth Day Revolution,' a timely reflection on music and the environment, coming shortly after Earth Day. Brinkley is the Katherine Tsanoff Brown Chair in Humanities and Professor of History at Rice University, CNN Presidential Historian, and a contributing editor at Vanity Fair." Brinkley's lecture will begin at 7pm ET and take place on-campus at Monmouth University's Great Hall Auditorium. This event is free and open to the public, but seating is limited, and advanced registration is required. To reserve your complimentary seat for the President’s Lecture, use the QR code below or click here.

February 23, 2024 On Tuesday, The Bruce Springsteen Archives and Center for American Music at Monmouth University officially announced the date and honorees for its 2024 American Music Honors event. As per the announcement, the annual American Music Honors ceremony "celebrates artists who have demonstrated artistic excellence, creative integrity, and a longstanding commitment to the value of music in our national consciousness." The 2024 honorees are: Jackson Browne - "a long-time social justice, environmental and educational activist who has supported everything from anti-nuclear alternative energy resources to political freedom in Central America" Dion DiMucci - "whose landmark recording of 'Abraham, Martin, and John' became an activist anthem in the late 1960s and beyond" John Mellencamp - "who, together with Willie Nelson and Neil Young, created Farm Aid in 1985. The social activism reflected in Mellencamp’s songs helped catalyze Farm Aid, the organization that has addressed the struggle of American family farmers that continues to this day" Mavis Staples - "who, in the 1960s, was on the frontlines of the civil rights movement and continues to use her music to support racial equality in America" “The Bruce Springsteen Archives & Center for American Music is proud to honor these musically, culturally, and politically important artists,” said Robert Santelli, Founding Executive Director of the Springsteen Archives. “All four artists—John Mellencamp, Jackson Browne, Mavis Staples, and Dion—have contributed mightily to the American music canon and have demonstrated how the power of song can act as an agent for positive change in our country.” The 2024 American Music Honors will take place on Wednesday, April 24 in West Long Branch, NJ at Monmouth University’s Pollak Theatre. Little Steven’s Disciples of Soul will serve as the event’s house band, as they did at last year's initial American Music Honors event. Award presenters will include Bruce Springsteen, Jon Landau, and 2023 American Music Honors recipients Darlene Love and Stevie Van Zandt. Tickets for the event will go on sale to the public on Tuesday, March 26 at 12 pm ET. Further information about tickets, etc. will be shared later at the website for The Bruce Springsteen Archives and Center for American Music at Monmouth University. For questions about sponsorship opportunities, please email awards@springsteenarchives.org

April 13, 2024 Best wishes for a happy 73rd birthday, and many, many more happy birthdays ahead, to one of the coolest drummers on the planet... Mighty Max Weinberg, of course. Just how cool is Max? Even "The Fonz," The King of Cool himself, dug The Mighty One after recently watching him in action in L.A.... Aaaaaaaay! Now THAT's cool! Happy Birthday, Max, and many more. Thanks for continuing to bring the power, AND the finesse, AND the expertise, AND the emotion, AND the dedication... night after night after night after night.

April 10, 2024 Fifty years ago tonight, Jon Landau first met Bruce Springsteen, on the same evening that Landau also saw Springsteen in concert for the first time, at the long-gone Charlie’s Place in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Just under a month later, Landau would see his second Springsteen concert on the night of May 9, 1974, when Bruce and his band opened for Bonnie Raitt at Cambridge's Harvard Square Theatre, also long gone. After the May 9 show, Landau went home and wrote “Growing Young With Rock and Roll,” his essay-as-concert-review for the long-defunct Boston-area alternative weekly newspaper The Real Paper that contained the now-famous sentence, “I saw rock and roll future and its name is Bruce Springsteen.” Landau and Springsteen quickly connected, becoming fast friends, and eventually Landau also would become a longtime key production collaborator from the Born To Run album onward, as well as Springsteen’s manager, a position he retains to this day. Their friendship-combined-with-music-business-partnership is among the most unique and longest-lasting ones in popular music, and that’s counting not just artist-manager partnerships, but all music-based partnerships in general, such as the similarly long-standing one between Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. It's also a partnership that has expanded and done much to fulfill the promise and potential of "rock and roll future" from five decades ago, not just resetting the bar for multiple generations of what could be achieved by a musician in the studios and on the stages, but also by redefining what successful management of a musical career looks like. Through the past five decades, the partnership between Springsteen and the Jon Landau Management team has produced one of the longest runs ever of great artistic achievements combined with immense commercial successes. And obviously "Team Springsteen" isn't quite finished just yet, either. Here's to all of the high points of the past, the present, and those that still lie ahead for this artist, his various collaborators, and his international, multi-generational audience, in our collective rock and roll futures.

April 4, 2024 Throughout what Larry David states will be the series' final season,The Hollywood Reporter's Jackie Strause has been checking in weekly with Jeff Schaffer, Curb Your Enthusiasm's executive producer and director/co-writer for all of this season's episodes. In this week's check-in, Schaffer gives Strause a behind-the-scenes account of getting to work with Bruce Springsteen as a guest-star in two of this season's ten episodes (so far, that is. Read on...) Schaffer describes the filming of one of Springsteen's lines, uttered during his appearance on Curb...'s latest episode, as "one of my favorite moments ever," not just in the show, but "like, in life...That was Bruce chiming in, which was amazing. We were like, ‘What! He’s so funny.'” Schaffer was even more surprised that Springsteen agreed to be on the show at all, since reaching out to Jon Landau Management about that possibility seemed to Schaffer to be such a long shot. It turned out, however, that Bruce is a Curb Your Enthusiasm fan and was happy to play a Curb-style version of himself on the show. Schaffer co-wrote the final season's story arc with Larry David back in 2022, and all of Springsteen's scenes were filmed in one day of December 2022, on the series' final shooting date for that year. Schaffer found Springsteen's comic improvisational skills especially impressive. “He’d seen the show, but a lot of people haven’t worked the way we do, where it’s not all scripted. Lots of things get said. And we kept telling him, ‘We’ll use the best stuff,’ so he could try everything. And he played around. He knew the basic beats, but he was in there adding and slugging around. We showed him the scenes because we were so happy with how they turned out.” Schaffer shares with Strause many more interesting behind-the-scenes details about filming Springsteen's scenes, and also hints that there just might be some more Springsteen to be seen in this Sunday's extra-long series finale. Click here to read Jackie Strause's Hollywood Reporter article in full. But please do yourself a favor and don't read it until you've first seen the most recent episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm (Season 12, Episode 9: ""Ken/Kendra.") Click here for more information on viewing options for Curb Your Enthusiasm. Trust us; you'll be very glad that you did, and avoided any/all spoilers. Enjoy!

April 2, 2024 Bruce Springsteen's second (and, given that it's the penultimate episode of what Larry David promises will be the series' final season, maybe final) appearance on the latest episode of HBO's Curb Your Enthusiasm is hilarious, and well worth the thirty-five minutes or so you'll spend watching it. The latest episode, which dropped on Easter Sunday and is entitled "Ken/Kendra," is the ninth episode of the series' twelfth season, and it links up to Springsteen's first appearance on the show in this season's second episode, "The Lawn Jockey" (about which we previously reported here.) In both episodes, Springsteen plays a version of himself, as do Larry David and most of the show's celebrity guest-stars, in a comically altered "reality" setting. In "The Lawn Jockey," Springsteen was seen just briefly as some of the show's characters watched him on television, praising a recent action by Larry David that was perceived widely as heroic. In "Ken/Kendra," however, Springsteen now wants to meet David in person, because he remains so impressed by David's supposed bravery and heroism. "Ken/Kendra" is very much centered around this meeting, with Springsteen's screen-time in the episode much longer than his screen-time in "The Lawn Jockey." And that's all we're telling you, and all you really need to know, even if you don't watch Curb Your Enthusiasm regularly, in order to enjoy Springsteen's dryly comic performance here. If you dug some of the similarly dry comic turns he's taken onstage in his concert performances of the past, especially in something like Springsteen On Broadway, then this is very much up your alley. Click here for more information on viewing options for Curb Your Enthusiasm.

March 22, 2024 How appropriate it was, this past Tuesday night, to witness the onstage return of Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band in a city named after the bird who rises from the ashes of the past. Of course, we already know that together onstage Bruce and the band become those heart-stoppin', pants-droppin', earth-shockin', hard-rockin', booty-shakin', earthquakin', love-makin', Viagra-takin', history-makin' legends we love, but even such legends have their limitations. And their resumed 2023-2024 tour certainly has tested those limitations like no previous tour of theirs has ever done. This tour, which remains centered around Letter To You, Springsteen's latest album with the E Street Band released back in the autumn of 2020, didn't even begin until early February of 2023, almost three years later than originally planned, due to the unforeseen COVID-19 pandemic. (The recording of Letter To You was completed quickly in November 2019, with an eye toward an album release and international tour that - if not for COVID-19 - probably would have launched no later than mid-year in 2020.) Then, just over a month after the long-delayed tour finally got rolling, a later phase of that same pandemic still dogged it, as various band members' illnesses forced several March 2023 dates to be rescheduled. By August of 2023, Bruce himself was privately struggling with peptic ulcer disease, which caused the one-year postponement of two August shows in Philadelphia, followed by the postponement of almost all scheduled September 2023 shows, and eventually the postponement of all of 2023's remaining scheduled concerts. So a tour that started off having been delayed for almost three years later then got delayed again for an extra half-year. More important, of course, was the concern over the health issues that caused those delays and postponements, especially with the ages of the band's leader and most of its key members. Fortunately, by this past Tuesday night, as proven onstage and later confirmed by Springsteen in yesterday's brief E Street Radio interview-by-phone, "I felt great and the whole band felt great... Knock on wood...everybody's been very healthy since then." Amen and hallelujah; they're back! It also was rather surprising to hear Springsteen reply in yesterday's E Street Radio interview, when asked by interviewer Jim Rotolo if he considered this a continuation of the 2023 tour or "a new tour," that he thinks "we're approaching it like it's a new tour." He quickly clarified, however, by adding, "There will be some things from last year that we'll hold over... some of my basic themes of mortality and life, and those things... I'm gonna keep set, but I think I'm gonna move around the other parts of the set a lot more, so there will be a much wider song-selection going on." One set-piece that he confirmed will remain intact, and indeed was a highlight of the show once again on Tuesday night, is the emotional one-two punch of the solo-acoustic-with-trumpet "Last Man Standing" (preceded by his introductory parable centered around the loss of former bandmate George Theiss) followed directly by the devastating full-band "I'm gonna carry it right here" performance of "Backstreets." Confirming yet again that nobody thinks more purposefully, instinctively, and deeply about his setlist and show than himself, Springsteen added, "Some of that second half of the set is built so solid that a lot of it will stay... The opening, I'm not sure what's gonna happen up top, but it'll shift around and I'm waiting to see myself just where the show's gonna take me." As a masterful live performer with such a large catalog of great material from which to choose, it's not surprising that Springsteen seems to be making the wisest moves he can make about his current concerts and their setlists. For the reasons stated above, Letter To You remains the newest album by Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band, and it's a very good one at that, with a clear, powerful main theme of embracing life while facing old age and death. It's obviously the foundation for the main artistic statement that Bruce wants to make with his current shows. So, based on what was played on Tuesday night, apparently he'll continue to include at least four key songs from that album (the title track, "Ghosts," "Last Man Standing," and "I'll See You In My Dreams") along with his version of "Nightshift," the one track from Springsteen's most recent non-E-Street-Band album - the soul-covers collection Only The Strong Survive - Covers, Vol. 1 - that fits perfectly with the main themes of Letter To You. He also did begin to "shift around" a bit as promised, opening the evening with a heart-pounding performance of The Rising's "Lonesome Day," which continues a change he started implementing on only the last four concerts performed in 2023. It's yet another song that fits perfectly with the Letter To You material and themes. The River's "Two Hearts," which had its tour debut in the last 2023 show, returned with gusto on Tuesday, as did the fine full-band version of "Don't Play That Song," another Only The Strong Survive highlight based on the classic Aretha Franklin arrangement, after an absence from the setlist of more than a year. "Don't Play That Song" provides yet one more great spotlight moment for the expanded band of this tour, giving both the E Street Choir and the E Street Horns an extra, well-deserved chance to shine. Apparently on the printed setlist it was a down-to-the-wire toss-up between whether "The E Street Shuffle" or "Don't Play That Song" would be played in that slot on Tuesday night, and "Don't Play That Song" won out in the end. Two songs not setlisted at all got played on Tuesday night, as well: the fun, down-and-dirty singalong tale of woe that is "Darlington County," previously performed only occasionally on this tour, mostly in Europe during the summer of 2023, and the never-fails rave-up cover of "Twist and Shout," making its first U.S.-date appearance on this tour (having been played at only three European shows last summer.) "Twist and Shout" was even a bona-fide sign request, coming from an eighteen-year-old fan attending his first concert. Baby steps, setlist-watchers and sign-makers; baby steps... But seriously, folks, in some circles there truly has been waaay too much hyper-focusing on what's going on with the setlists. Perhaps it's important for at least some of us to remember that reading any given show's setlist never conveys the complete experience of witnessing the actual concert. That's like believing that reading a song's printed lyrics is the same experience as hearing the song performed by talented musicians, or that reading the script of a play is the same experience as seeing the play performed by a masterful group of actors. (It's also one of the reasons why it's so ridiculous that most U.S. students still have to spend so much more time reading many more of Shakespeare's plays than they get to see the plays actually performed professionally, as they were meant to be experienced.) But while we're on the subject of scripts, this is hands-down the most tightly-"scripted" E Street Band show that Springsteen has ever done. Clearly he's adapted the approach he developed with his solo Springsteen on Broadway show, as Stevie Van Zandt astutely observed early on. Consistently, there remains very little spontaneous "off-script" speaking to the crowd, as was the case (even more so, of course) with Springsteen on Broadway. Yet simultaneously, and this is one major way where this tour differs significantly from Springsteen on Broadway, overall there is very little speaking to the audience between songs. On this tour, the music itself does almost all of the talkin', and very well at that. Whenever Bruce does speak extensively from the stage on this tour, as happens during the introductory words about deceased former bandmate George Theiss before "Last Man Standing," it's actually more like another song performance in terms of how measured and prepared it is. But to me, that just means that Springsteen's now got a very firm grip on exactly what he wants to communicate to his audience on any given night, in terms of both his spoken and sung words. Despite his long-standing greatness as a live performer, that level of clarity and confidence hasn't always been the case for him, especially in younger years and earlier performances. I, for one, am totally fine with this shift, particularly since I have no problem experiencing a truly great work of art - be it a great song, album, book, film, play, etc. - repeatedly. It doesn't matter as much to me how prepared or repeated it is; all that really matters is if it somehow reaches me emotionally and/or intellectually as an actively attentive and participatory audience member in whatever's happening on that stage, in that moment, on that night. But if you're a huge fan of Bruce Springsteen appearing to be more spontaneous or off-the-cuff onstage, your mileage may vary here, of course. One result of a show that's more tightly structured is that those rare, off-the-cuff, can't-be-gleaned-from-a-setlist moments can become even more special and treasured. Such was the case on Tuesday night when Jake Clemons' sax solo during "Mary's Place" brought a huge smile to Springsteen's face. Bruce seemed especially pleased with Jake's handling of that solo, indeed turning to also-beaming Stevie Van Zandt and yelling audibly, "Sounds good!" They looked like two proud, excited parents watching one of their kids nail their first violin recital. Truth be told, while reading the setlist doesn't convey the total concert experience, neither does any report or review of the show, including this one. But I hope that at least I have managed to convey to my readers here just how great it is to see a fully recovered Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band back onstage again, delivering once more such a unique, powerful, fun, inspiring, healing, and renewing experience. In closing, I can't help but think of what music-writer and Springsteen-biographer Dave Marsh once wrote about the day that Elvis Presley died: "That night, on national television, speaking in a blur and fighting back tears, I said that the worst part for me was that Elvis was supposed to be around for much, much longer, as a sort of national treasure to be shared with my children and grandchildren." How fortunate we all are, even (or rather especially) in these often very dark and scary days, that a certain Elvis-fan-turned-rock-star from the great state of New Jersey, with help from some beloved companions along the way, has followed a very different path to a much better fate, and become an international treasure shared with multiple generations of fans. Viva Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band! -All March 19, 2024 Phoenix, AZ concert photos by Shawn Poole A brief note about our 2024 tour coverage moving forward... Just how extensively "there will be a much wider song-selection going on" will affect greatly how many individual Letters To You concert reports/reviews we will post. Unless one night Bruce and the band decide to play one or more extremely rare or new setlist addition(s) or radically alter the setlist in some other way(s,) if the current show overall remains relatively similar to Springsteen on Broadway in its stability, you probably won't see from us as many extensive accounts of or reactions to each individual show. (This was the approach taken at my old stomping grounds - the late, great Backstreets.com - during both runs of Springsteen on Broadway, in which there wasn't a report/review posted for every single show. Of course, Springsteen on Broadway was much more scripted and structured than the current tour is, so we'll see...) That noted, we are always up for considering anyone's writing about any Springsteen concert-event they attend, especially if you somehow have a unique perspective and/or experience to share. Therefore, if you'd like to share any such writing or ideas for our consideration, please feel free to email us at editor@letterstoyou.net. The same goes for any concert photos you'd like to share with us for consideration. Thanks, everyone, and best wishes to all for many more great shows ahead!

March 28, 2024 Last night's Zach Bryan concert at Brooklyn's Barclays Center featured a surprise guest who probably was on very few folks' bingo cards: Bruce Springsteen, who's due onstage for his own concert with the E Street Band in San Francisco tonight, in less than 24 hours after he was still onstage in Brooklyn! Springsteen joined Bryan - who was wearing a vintage black Reunion Tour t-shirt - in performing Bryan's unreleased song "Sandpaper," and later returned for the show-closing performance of "Revival" with Bryan, his band, and other special guest Maggie Rogers. The "Zach Bryan Archive" fan-operated Facebook page has posted brief video clips from both performances. Click here and here to view them. The Archives' Instagram page also has another brief clip that can be viewed here. The backstage and setlist photos in this report are from the Archives' Facebook page, as well. Safe travels out West, Boss, and be sure to catch up on your sleep, ya crazy old codger!

March 27, 2024 It was announced officially yesterday that Bruce Springsteen is the latest songwriter to be named an Ivors Academy Fellow, the highest honor bestowed by the organization. The Ivors Academy is the UK’s professional association for songwriters and composers. Springsteen becomes the first-ever non-UK-native songwriter that the Academy has inducted into Fellowship since its founding eighty years ago. (U.S.-born contemporary-classical-music composer John Adams and the late French contemporary-classical-music composer/conductor Pierre Boulez also are non-UK-native Fellows.) He joins a prestigious group that includes Joan Armatrading CBE, John Barry OBE, Kate Bush CBE, Peter Gabriel, Sir Barry Gibb CBE, Maurice Gibb CBE, Robin Gibb CBE, Sir Elton John, Annie Lennox OBE, Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber, Sir Paul McCartney, Sir Tim Rice, and Sting. The induction will be awarded officially to Springsteen at this year's annual Ivors with Amazon Music awards ceremony, which will take place at Grosvenor House in London on Thursday, May 23. The Ivors Academy and the Ivor Novello Awards are named after Welsh actor, dramatist, singer, and composer Ivor Novello, who became one of the most popular British entertainers in the first half of the 20th century. Among his many accomplishments, Novello wrote the World-War-I-period ballad "Keep the Home Fires Burning" and starred in Alfred Hitchcock's groundbreaking silent film The Lodger. As per yesterday's official announcement, Tom Gray, Chair of The Ivors Academy, said, “There is no one more fitting than Bruce Springsteen to be the first international songwriter inducted into our Fellowship. Songwriters are powerful storytellers, who capture our lives, loves and hardships. Bruce has always told the greatest stories. The Fellowship marks the esteem in which he is held by all those who share his craft.” Springsteen himself added, “I’m proud to be the first international songwriter to be recognized by The Ivors Academy. In addition to recognizing my songwriting, the award stands as a tribute to the fans and friends who have supported me and my work for the last fifty years. This entire country has made me feel welcome every step of the way, and for this, I will always remain deeply appreciative.” Click here to read more. Congratulations, Bruce!

March 27, 2024 As reported yesterday by Deadline and then confirmed by Variety, plans are afoot to adapt Warren Zanes' book Deliver Me From Nowhere: The Making of Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska into a dramatic-narrative film. Actor-turned-writer-director Scott Cooper will helm the project, with actor Jeremy Allen White identified as the top choice to play Bruce Springsteen (though White hasn't yet signed on officially.) The film will be the first music-oriented "biopic" centered around any aspect of Springsteen's life and career. According to Deadline's report, "Springsteen and his manager Jon Landau are actively involved in the project, and more details will be forthcoming." Hmm. On "paper," so to speak, this project seems to have very strong trainwreck potential. And Letters To You has posted some misgivings with Zanes' book itself. (See our editor's note here.) On the other hand, Scott Cooper is the kind of talented writer-director who just might be able to pull off what seems like such an offbeat idea. And despite what we see as the EXTREMELY-less-than-stellar track-record of musician-biopics in general, we still have all fingers and toes crossed that in the end, Deliver Me From Nowhere will turn out to be a great film. Let's watch what happens next...

November 5, 2023 Today marks the official 50th anniversary of the release of The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Shuffle. In the afterglow of Bruce Springsteen himself having joined The Bruce Springsteen Archives & Center for American Music in getting a jump on celebrating the album's golden jubilee last weekend, our friends at E Street Radio have cooked up something special for today's 50th anniversary proper. Jim Rotolo and Greg Drew (who's also one of our Letters To You contributors) will dive into the album track-by-track, discussing and playing each one, and even including some of the outtakes. E Street Radio's The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Shuffle track-by-track special will make its on-air debut today, Sunday November 5, at 3pm ET on SiriusXM Channel 20. Other upcoming airdates and times are: Monday, November 6 at 10am ET Tuesday, November 7 at 4pm ET Wednesday, November 8 at 8am ET Thursday, November 9 at 6pm ET Friday, November 10 at 9am ET Saturday, November 11 at 5pm ET SiriusXM subscribers can listen to this special program on-demand/online, as well, via the SiriusXM app. Letters To You also is marking today's anniversary with a special "Temporary Tillie Takeover" of our website. Our standard postage-stamp logo is being replaced for a bit by another postage-stamp logo, also created by ace artist Stephen Winchell (with website consultant Brian Samelson applying a bit of his postmark-tweaking magic, as well.) This one, of course, features Tillie, the legendary Asbury Park Palace Amusements icon who remains immortal even in the face of shameful neglect - and sometimes worse - by certain Jersey Shore developers, politicians, bureaucrats, etc. Tillie also was a major figure in the original ad campaign for The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Shuffle, as can be seen in the vintage full-page ad pictured above. And for Washington, DC/Virginia-area fans, the WIESS@50 celebration will continue into Thanksgiving Weekend 2023, thanks to the DC-area special-musical-events production company known as Newmyer Flyer. On Saturday, November 25, a group of DC-based musicians will perform the songs from The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Shuffle, as well as the songs from another classic album that was a major influence on Springsteen's second LP: Van Morrison's 1970 masterpiece Moondance. (Check out the poster designed for this event, too: an ingenious album-covers mashup that suggests the possibility that Moondance's influence might have been at least somewhat visual as well as musical.) This special concert will take place at The Barns at Wolf Trap in Vienna, VA. Click here for more info and to buy tickets.