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October 22, 2023 Last week, it was hailed repeatedly (and correctly) as a badly needed shot of hope and positivity during yet another period when more concerns over deadly violence and war were foremost in so many minds, locally and around the planet. One by one, elected officials took to the podium to tout the positive impact that this project will have on the region. And even Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Ms. Darlene Love, the true Queen of Christmas herself, was on hand to herald like an angel the big announcement related to a longtime friend and strong supporter of hers. Just in case you missed it, last Wednesday The Bruce Springsteen Archives & Center for American Music (BASCAM) at Monmouth University officially announced its plans to construct a new 30,000-square-foot building to house the Archives, the Center for American Music, related exhibition galleries, and a 230-seat, state-of-the-art theater, to be located on Monmouth University's campus, with an anticipated Spring 2026 ribbon-cutting ceremony. The announcement finally made official and public what the university's president, Dr. Patrick F. Leahy, jokingly referred to as "the worst-kept secret in New Jersey." And as expected, Bruce Springsteen himself also was on hand to confirm and celebrate the big news. Letters To You was there, as well, and we've prepared for you an appropriately extra-large feature for such a major announcement, including some more great shots by our contributing "JerseyStyle Photographer" Mark Krajnak. Below you can read all of the details on this exciting project shared last Wednesday by BASCAM's Executive Director Robert Santelli, accompanied by images shown during his slide-presentation and printed in the event's press-kit. We also have transcribed Bruce Springsteen's public remarks and the closing remarks of BASCAM's Director Eileen Chapman. And before we get to all of that, we've dug even deeper into some of the important but lesser-known history that led to last Wednesday's announcement. Coincidentally, the big announcement occurred exactly six years after the now-defunct Friends of The Bruce Springsteen Special Collection donated its entire collection, numbering almost 35,000 items, to the then-newly-formed Bruce Springsteen Archives & Center for American Music. These donated items currently remain the bulk of the Archives' current holdings of approximately 37,000 items. Click the link below to download and read a PDF of the archived October 18, 2017 Monmouth University press release announcing this major donation: Also check out this archival 2005 NYTimes.com video showing members of The Friends of The Bruce Springsteen Special Collection in action at the Collection's original home, Asbury Park Public Library: Now let's shift from a detailed look at the past behind The Bruce Springsteen Archives & Center for American Music to October 18, 2023's full-scale preview of its exciting future... Remarks by Robert Santelli, Executive Director, The Bruce Springsteen Archives and Center for American Music: This is a monumental occasion for someone who not only graduated from here and also was a member of the faculty here, but also someone who basically lived most of his life on the Jersey Shore. And to see this dream come true with my colleagues, to sit here and look at all of you today and realize a dream is about to come true... I'm very touched by it. Thanks to all of you for being here today; it's great. In 1969, I was a skinny seventeen-year-old freshman, and we had Freshman Orientation. And right here in the back [on the lawn behind Monmouth University's Great Hall,] a band called Steel Mill was our Freshman Orientation entertainment. We actually have a photograph in the Archives of a very similarly skinny Bruce Springsteen leading Steel Mill, a band prior to the creation of the E Street Band. I went on to join The Outlook [Monmouth University's student-run newspaper] staff, became Entertainment Editor, and write about a lot of the music we had here back in the late sixties and early seventies. Bruce and the band played here numerous times, and I got the opportunity to establish a relationship. And as I became a music journalist, having access over the years whenever I wanted to do a story or an interview - Bruce giving access and the members of the E Street Band doing the same - it allowed me to understand the importance of Bruce and the band and their relationship not just to the Jersey Shore, but to all of New Jersey. And when the opportunity came to bring the Archives... and there is an Archives now. We live on this campus right now. We're overstuffed in a small house here with some 37,000 pieces already. The thought was that when it came time to establish some sort of game-plan that would allow Bruce's archives to stay in New Jersey - after all, there isn't another artist that I could think of that is so synonymous with this state like Bruce - the thought was it had to be here, because as we spoke earlier, Bruce and I recalled that many of Bruce's earliest fans came from [what was then called] Monmouth College, and from West Long Branch. And his having written not just a song, but the entire album Born to Run, just down the street made it an ideal place to do this. We started out with a dream, and there are two people in particular on my team that I need to bring attention to, because without them, this definitely would not have happened, and quite honestly, I would not have embarked on it without both of them being part of the original team. One of whom you've already met, and that's Eileen Chapman. Eileen and I go back - hard to believe, and I hope it's okay to say this - fifty years or so, in our friendship. Our relationship started with The Jersey Shore Jazz & Blues Foundation and Festival, and we've done so many things together over the years. And then the second person is someone that I went to high-school with, and consider my best friend... my sister, actually, who in three days will retire from this endeavor, but I wanted to make sure we announced this [before her retirement] because she had such a big part in getting to this day... Syd Whalley. What I want to do for you is to give you a sense of what this building is going to look like and what's going to be in it, but in addition to that, also talk about the mission... why we're doing this. We had mentioned [earlier] that there's a Woody Guthrie Center and archives in Tulsa, as there is a Bob Dylan Center in Tulsa, as well. There's a Buddy Holly Center - a small one, but it's really the first one - in Lubbock, Texas. So those are the three main, if you will, artist-related centers or institutions that exist in America. What we wanted to do here with the Bruce Springsteen Archives was far more ambitious. I think when Jon [Landau] and I first asked Bruce about this, and I got a chance to tell him what I thought was my vision and the vision that I represent for Monmouth, we said to him, "This is what we have in mind, and this is what we'd like to do." I think Bruce thought for a minute, and basically he said something that we have never forgotten, and it's simply, "Y'know, this is all well and good... wanting to keep me in New Jersey and keep the archives here. But really, I'm just an ongoing chapter of American music. I'm just a piece of the larger, bigger story that continues to impact who we are as Americans and how the world looks at us." And so the idea of creating something larger than just The Bruce Springsteen Archives came to be, and we became The Bruce Springsteen Archives & Center for American Music. And it was a great idea, because the idea is something that doesn't happen anywhere else in America. We'll be the first place to tell the major story from an educational and academic point of view. This building will house all of these entities under one umbrella, and it will allow teachers, scholars, journalists, students, and certainly fans from all over the world to come here and dig deep, not just into the legacy of Springsteen, but into our incredible, great story of American music that continues to unfold today, and will continue to unfold. Traveling all over the world, I have the opportunity to lecture in places where... I can go to Chile, or I can go to Argentina, and I'll hear American music. Or Europe, or China, or Japan. Our American music tradition is so strong, so powerful, and so meaningful, to not just us Americans, but also people from around the globe. All you have to do is go see Bruce in concert over in Europe, as I was able to do do this past summer, and feel the love and respect, not just of Bruce and the E Street Band, but of what we've accomplished musically as Americans. So the hope is that this building allows all of that to live, and breathe, and nourish particularly future generations of Americans. Young kids who come to this particular facility will learn about the story of American music and how it's impacted racism in this country... how it's attacked racism in this country, how it's developed through technology, how we are able to talk about the reflection of our current fundamental values as Americans. All of this is embedded in our music. It's embedded in Bruce's, as well, which is why he's the ultimate, if you will, narrator of this great story in our building. So that's the game plan. That's the premise by which we started out this project. What I'm gonna do is give you a little bit of a slideshow and show you what it's gonna look like, and I'll explain briefly what is inside, so you get a true understanding of the importance of this institution. The building, by the way, was designed and created by COOKFOX Architects, an acclaimed architectural firm from New York City. Rick Cook is here today - he's our principal architect - as are members of his team. We worked together to put together a building that was reflective of Bruce's roots, Bruce's music, and also the state of New Jersey. So it's a building that basically when you walk into it, you'll walk on... let's just call it a wooden boardwalk. Of course, why not, right? But you'll pass a date that's really, really important... September 9, 1956. This is the date that Elvis Presley appears on The Ed Sullivan Show that Bruce watched, as did many, many other baby-boomers. It was a defining moment in our growth as an American music. And so when you walk past that, now you are entering into what we think is hallowed space when it comes to the American music story. As you walk into the space, there are two levels. It's a 30,000-square-foot building, as President Leahy said. It's not meant to be overly bombastic or overly rich or elegant in its architectural values. Rick and his team did a wonderful job listening to Springsteen's music and other aspects of American music, and creating an exterior design that reflects it. You'll see here a side-view and notice there is a huge window area that will allow natural space to come in, and basically be a wonderful viewing point for people who are sitting in our theater, which I'll explain [in more detail] in just a second. The grounds will allow students to hang out there, play their music, and it's very, very close to where [Monmouth University Chair of the Music & Theater Arts Department] Joe Rapolla and the Music Industry program create their music for Blue Hawk Records. We hope that it also will be a place where, if you will, pilgrims to our museum and to our campus will be able to hang out and absorb the weather like today's on the Jersey Shore. When you walk in, on the first floor, there will be a long foyer that separates the two main aspects of the institution. On one side is a 230-seat state-of-the-art theater where we will have film series, workshops, lectures, special guests, and intimate performances in the evening. But during the day, there will be shown an approximately fifteen- to seventeen-minutes-long film designed by Thom Zimny, which will tell the story of American music and, put in its proper context, the story of Bruce Springsteen. So as you walk in, that's gonna be the first thing that you see. You'll experience that, and then walk over to the other side of the first floor of the building. There you will have a major exhibition on American music. This exhibition will be highly interactive. We will work with our partners at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, the Smithsonian, the Grammy Museum, and a number of other major music-museum institutions that already exist, and we will create the story of American music in a way that is appropriate and relevant to young people, particularly high-school kids. So it's our thought that on a day like this, or even a cold, wintry day in January, that parking-lot that sits adjacent to the building will be filled with school-buses. This will become a major educational resource for high-school and middle-school teachers across the state... actually in the tri-state area. So the kinds of exhibits that will be in this main gallery will play directly to that, so that teachers will be allowed to bring American music into their classrooms, much like [the approach of] another partner of ours, Steve Van Zandt and his TeachRock program, which are first cousins of The Bruce Springsteen Archives & Center for American Music. Together we will create lesson-plans and opportunities for teachers and students to learn about this great tradition. We'll then go upstairs, and we'll go into the areas where we have the true archives and more exhibition space. The exhibition space upstairs will concentrate on Bruce's story, and it will allow us to dig deep into his creative process. That's the most important thing. There are many biographies about Bruce; his story is certainly well known. But what we want to do as a source of inspiration, for young people in particular, is to examine the creative process. So you'll find exhibits up there on Bruce as a songwriter. We're going to see him as a person who has drawn from a well of American music greats before him, from Bob Dylan, Robert Johnson, Hank Williams, and so many others, and examine how that particular set of influences creates his unique sound and body of work. We'll also recreate... and I think this is really a wonderful thing... Bruce didn't go to college. He never graduated from Monmouth, although he wishes he did, I'm sure. But he's self-educated, and I think a lot had to do with Jon Landau throwin' books his way, saying, "Read this, read this..." The opportunity to recreate Bruce's writing-room, and all of the books that he read as he began this ongoing, life-long self-education process, will be there. So people will be able to see the books that he read, and then also as you walk in you'll be able to hear a personal tour of that room, why he read the books he read, and what they meant to him. So it'll be a great opportunity for teachers of literature, for instance, or sociology, or American Studies... to point out these very, very important books that helped create this great American voice. On the other side of the building we will also have an E Street Band gallery, in which we will tell the story of the E Street Band, many of whom grew up in New Jersey and have a deeply profound connection to the Jersey Shore and Monmouth, as well. So we'll tell their story, and how they helped Bruce create that sound that we all know and love. There will be a photo-gallery up there, which will show some of the great photographs in Bruce's career, and [other] American music greats, as well. That will be a rotating exhibit, but it will be something that brings the visual aspects of the story to life. And when you're finished with all of that, then you'll walk over to the Archives. And in the Archives, which is where "the stuff" is held, so to speak... There are many archives around America, and many of them are located in libraries on very prestigious campuses that are hushed and hallowed, and when you walk in, you need to be very quiet because people are reading or studying. This will not be that; it will be loud. There will be opportunities for people to engage in the music in a way that probably no other archives allows. You'll be able to go in there, put on a pair of headphones, and listen to interviews and oral histories, perhaps concert performances... things that will allow what you have just seen in the exhibits to come alive in even greater detail. You'll be able to look at posters all the way back to the days of The Castiles, Bruce's first band, on all the way through [to the present.] We're in the process of engaging in a very serious attempt to get as many oral histories of American music greats as possible, and we are doing that so that when students or scholars come in and do research, not only will they be able to listen to the Jersey Shore sound, whether it be Southside Johnny or Bruce or Max Weinberg or whomever, but also those who are still alive and still able to tell their story. We are in the process of capturing those, as well. So when you're finished with that, you're talking about a two- or three-hours experience. Then hopefully you'll grab some lunch and head for The Stone Pony, or over to Freehold, where we will be hopefully talking about someday soon a sister-project there that will complete the process and complete the story as we know it. That in essence is what we're talking about, if all goes well. And it doesn't always, but we're keeping our fingers crossed. We'd like to open these doors sometime in the spring of 2026, and that is our goal. It's an admirable goal... We still have a little bit more to raise money-wise, but as soon as that's done, the shovel goes into the ground and we're ready to go. We're very excited, but I just want you to know that we're not sitting around just raising money or just thinking how great this building's gonna be. We're already very, very active as an institution. For instance, next weekend, here at Monmouth we will be celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of Bruce's second album, The Wild, the Innocent, and the E Street Shuffle with a symposium that's bringing people from as far away, believe it or not, as Israel to come and examine this particular great album. It will be done in a way that looks at it in a serious, not so much academic way, but let's call it an educational way. So those of you who were unfortunate and didn't get tickets because it literally sold out in ten minutes... 700 tickets... we'll archive all of this. So you'll be able to come to the [new] Archives [building] once it's open, and be able to watch this. We did one earlier this year, in January, for the debut album Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J. Same thing; 700 people showed up, so there's a lot of interest in what we're doing already. We have exhibitions on the road right now, two or three of them, that are in Boston and California. We'll be premiering a major new exhibition, believe it or not, in February, and it opens at the LBJ Presidential Library in Austin, Texas, and will go to the Bush Library and Clinton Library. The Presidential Libraries are interested in our American music story and the way we tell it, so it's very exciting. We're not standing still until 2026. We are on our way. Finally I'll say that next spring we will be announcing a teacher advisory board, where teachers from all over the state will be able to engage with us, to help us make certain that the exhibits that we build and the archives that we create are relevant to young people, so that they get the most out of it as possible. I would just like to say to Pat {Leahy] in particular, and to Jon, and to Bruce... It's been an honor for me to lead this project and to be a part of it, both personally and professionally. I was born in Jersey City and moved down to the Jersey Shore, living in Point Pleasant Beach. I went to school here, of course, and was an early music critic at The Asbury Park Press. My roots run very, very deep here. And I have to say, as I said before, as a young journalist starting out, having access to Bruce and the band in the early days when I was struggling just to make a name and get in the magazines... where Jon already was but he never hired me, but that's alright... Anyway, for us to bring it full circle is important to me both personally and professionally. So I want to thank Pat and Monmouth University for giving me the opportunity to be a part of this, and I look forward to seeing all of you at groundbreaking. Thank you. At this time, I'd like to invite Bruce Springsteen up to say a few words... Remarks by Bruce Springsteen: Thank you. The first thing I want to say is how happy I am that my archives are going to have a home right here in New Jersey. That means a lot to me, and for that I've got to thank Pat Leahy, Bob Santelli, Mr. Jon Landau, our Director Eileen Chapman, and our donors, of course, because without them there's no building. Many of them are here today. Thank you for your generosity and support. And it looks like here with us... Ms. Darlene Love, who's sittin' right there in the first row. Now, having a building with your name on it is a tricky thing, because I'm still alive, and in forty years of analysis, the only thing I know is that I'm subject to any kind of behavior. I mean, I could get arrested for shooting tequilas in a public park. That's something that could happen. All I can say is that I will try to do my best to do nothing for the rest of my life to embarrass a building. Just in case, I might suggest to the architect... the letters should be removable. But believe it or not, there are people who come from around the world, for their vacations or their pilgrimages, to spend their hard-earned dollars in Asbury Park or Freehold, in search of from whence I have hailed, and now they will actually have some place to go other than my house. So I'm glad about that. I'm glad about getting all of the junk out of my house, because it was getting cluttered in there, so now I've got some place to put that stuff. But seriously, I'm moved by all of your efforts and commitment. At nineteen, as Bob was saying, I played on these very steps out here, and so to stand here today is quite humbling, knowing that I'm going to be a presence on this campus, which I really look forward to being. It's deeply satisfying. I look forward to working with everyone to make the building and its endeavor a great success. Thank you. Closing remarks by Eileen Chapman, Director, The Bruce Springsteen Archives and Center for American Music: How cool was that?! Thank you to all of today's speakers for supporting this project so enthusiastically. Your leadership, persistence, and vision have helped us to get to this point. And a special thanks to Bruce Springsteen, whose influence on American music is deserving of such lasting recognition and celebration... and to Darlene Love, who thought she was gonna sneak in unnoticed. Please visit our website and social-media platforms over the coming months as we update our progress. This concludes our program today. Thank you for joining us for today's announcement, and for your support of this extraordinary project... We look forward to seeing you at the grand opening. Special thanks to Carl Beams, Eileen Chapman, Bob Crane, Melanie Paggioli, and David Wilson

November 13, 2023 This month's edition of E Street Radio's Legendary E Street Band focuses on the band-leader's Hall-of-Fame-level songwriting prowess. The show's host (and Letters To You contributor) Greg Drew spends almost an hour-and-a-half discussing and playing only recordings of songs written by Bruce Springsteen, surveying multiple decades of Springsteen having continued to create combinations of music and words that connect deeply with multiple generations of listeners. And that's just Part One! In this episode, Greg explores Bruce's songwriting only from the early seventies through the early nineties. Next month's episode will continue the exploration through to the present. The episode debuted this morning, with re-airings scheduled throughout this week as follows: Tuesday, November 14 at 4pm ET Wednesday, November 15 at 8am ET Thursday, November 16 at 6pm ET Friday, November 17 at 9am ET Saturday, November 18 at 5pm ET SiriusXM subscribers soon will be able to listen to this episode on-demand/online, as well, via the SiriusXM app.

November 11, 2023 The irony of flying to Vietnam on Veterans Day in 1970 and flying home and becoming a veteran on Veterans Day 1971 never ceases to bewilder me. How does one advance from soldier to veteran without knowing what it all means and what responsibilities it carries? I think my World-War-II-veteran dad struggled with the same questions, but he never talked about it. Sure, until he passed away in 2009, Jack Bradley and I would wish one another a happy Veterans Day every November 11. But without ever taking the conversation any further… Still, the fact that we were both veterans linked us in ways only other combatants could know. And while we never talked to the other in detail about what we did and what we saw, our silence told the honest stories: the truth about fear and courage, the reality of pain and loss, the experience of coming home but - even though we both came back “whole” - never completely making it… I’m still searching, which is maybe why on every November 11, I repeat my own Veterans Day rituals: ...re-reading the one letter I received from my dad when I was in Vietnam... ...and listening to Bruce Springsteen. My wife usually reads me my dad’s letter because I get too emotional reading it myself. My mom was the one who usually wrote me letters while I was stationed in Vietnam, but this one time my dad sensed I was anxious about my relationship with the girl I’d left behind and about what I was witnessing in Vietnam, so he took pen to paper. A herculean undertaking for a guy with just a GED. But his words soothed me, comforted me, and helped me to keep on keepin’ on. A modest letter from a father to his son, but one I will always treasure. Likewise with Bruce’s songs. Or are they poems? For me, they’re more like letters, letters from him to men and women like me who our country forgot about. One year it may be “Born in the U.S.A.” Another, “Shut Out The Light.” “Tucson Train” will sometimes take center stage, as will “Gypsy Biker” and “Brothers Under The Bridge.” But more often than not, I come back to Bruce’s song “The Wall,” which for me is his letter to Walter Cichon and Bart Haynes, beloved friends and fellow New Jersey musicians, both of whom died in Vietnam and whose names are engraved like “skin on black stone” on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington D. C. During a concert in Charlotte, North Carolina, on April 19, 2014, Bruce gave what I believe is his purest, most honest and visceral rendition of “The Wall.” He called it “a short prayer for my country,” and later he officially released this live version in online-video form. Again, it’s a letter to America, asking us to not do this again, to heed the advice of our veterans themselves who say “never again.” "But of course,” as Bruce reminds us, “it happens again and again…” Give it a look and a listen, and let your heart sink and ache for all that loss... And when you’re done listening, listen again. And then remember names like Cichon and Haynes and the 58,310 other U.S. citizens who died in that war. And the names of all of those Vietnamese people who died in our name. “Apology and forgiveness got no place here at all, here at the wall,” Bruce repeats at the close. And then a trumpet echoes, much like a bugle playing taps, followed by a chorus of voices singing... no, wailing, in pain and loss. Sometimes I hear my dad’s voice in that chorus. He fancied himself a crooner like Frank Sinatra or Johnny Hartman and even sang with a USO Band for a while. He’s in there, as are Walter and Bart. And Bruce and me. I’ll read my dad’s letter again today and listen to “The Wall.” And thanks to my father and Bruce, I’ll make plans to keep pushin' 'til it's understood. Vietnam veteran Doug Bradley is the author of Who’ll Stop the Rain: Respect, Remembrance, and Reconciliation in Post-Vietnam America, co-author with Craig Werner of We Gotta Get Out of This Place: The Soundtrack of the Vietnam War, which was named best music book of 2015 by Rolling Stone magazine, and author of DEROS Vietnam: Dispatches from the Air-Conditioned Jungle, now also available as an audiobook.

November 9, 2023 The January 20, 2024 main event of Light of Day Winterfest 2024, also known as "Bob's Birthday Bash" in honor of The Light of Day Foundation, Inc.'s co-founder Bob Benjamin, will take place at The Count Basie Center for the Arts' Hackensack Meridian Health Theatre in Red Bank, NJ. The headlining act will be Max Weinberg's Jukebox, featuring Mighty Max supported by the members of The Weeklings. Other venues hosting LOD WinterFest 2024 shows include: Asbury Park’s Stone Pony, Wonder Bar, McLoone’s Supper Club, Watermark, Berkeley Oceanfront Hotel; Deal’s Axelrod Performing Arts Center; Outpost In The Burbs in Montclair; City Winery in Manhattan and Philadelphia; and Penguin Rep Theatre in Stony Point, NY. All performances and events will raise money and awareness for the continuing battle to defeat Parkinson’s disease and its related illnesses ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis) and PSP (Progressive Supranuclear Palsy) within our lifetime. Tickets for “Bob’s Birthday Bash” featuring Max Weinberg's Jukebox, as well as a separate Winterfest tribute-bands show scheduled for January 12 (along with various ticket combo packages,) will go on sale tomorrow, Friday, November 10 at 10:00 am ET and will be available via theBASIE.org, the Basie Center box office onsite at 99 Monmouth Street in Red Bank and through Ticketmaster.com. Ticket prices range from $89.50-$425.50 (plus additional fees where applicable) with various multi-tiered packages being offered: “On-Stage All-Access,” “Platinum All-Access,” Gold All-Access,” “Silver All-Access,” and “Bronze All-Access." Tickets for all other WinterFest 2024 performances will go on sale on Friday, November 17. For more details on lineups, performances and ticket packages, visit LightofDay.org. The Light of Day Foundation, Inc., utilizes the power of music to raise money and awareness in its continuing battle to defeat Parkinson’s disease and its related illnesses ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis) and PSP (Progressive Supranuclear Palsy) within our lifetime. The concerts and the organization began as a birthday party in November 1998 at the Downtown Cafe in Red Bank, NJ to celebrate the 40th birthday of artist manager and music industry veteran Bob Benjamin. Benjamin had recently been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, a degenerative disorder of the central nervous system, and in lieu of gifts, asked that donations be made to the Parkinson’s Disease Foundation. Over $2,000 was raised that night. Spurred by the generosity and support, Benjamin reached out to friends, including concert promoter Tony Pallagrosi and musician Joe D’Urso, and formed the Light of Day charity, taking its name from the Bruce Springsteen song. The first official Light of Day concert was held at Asbury Park, NJ’s legendary Stone Pony in November 2000 and primarily featured local, unsigned artists. The critically acclaimed Pittsburgh-based band Joe Grushecky and the Houserockers (managed by Benjamin) headlined the show, which featured a surprise appearance by Bruce Springsteen, who joined the Houserockers for a raucous hour-long set. Over the years Light of Day has grown from a one-day event into a festival spanning 10 days in the New Jersey/New York metropolitan area. More significantly, Light of Day has expanded into an internationally recognized tour, through a true grassroots effort of musicians, music fans and benefactors. Light of Day shows take place around the world on three continents, including six shows in Canada, an eighteen-days late-November-into-December trek through Europe, with stops in England, Wales, Ireland, Sweden, Belgium, Norway, Denmark, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, and Spain, as well as an additional Light of Day event in Australia. Portions of the proceeds from each show are donated to a local Parkinson's organization. Just Around The Corner, an award-winning documentary about Bob Benjamin’s battle with Parkinson’s and the history of Light of Day (with extensive concert footage,) was produced by Ohio-based Flat Broke Productions and released by Virgil Films in 2012. Click here to purchase the DVD and/or click here for DVD/streaming options. Click here to donate directly in support of Light of Day.

November 7, 2023 It was just one day after the official 50th anniversary of his now-classic second album The Wild, The Innocent, & The E Street Shuffle and, to paraphrase a lyric from one of that album's outtakes... Thundercrack! Bruce Springsteen was back... to performing live, that is. He was a surprise, unannounced addition to last night's musical lineup for the 17th Annual Stand Up For Heroes Benefit, presented by The Bob Woodruff Foundation and the New York Comedy Festival. He looked and sounded great, indicating that he's continuing to recover successfully from the illness that forced him back in late September to postpone all of his remaining scheduled tour dates in 2023 (one of which would've kept him from playing Stand Up For Heroes 2023 last night, if it hadn't been postponed.) Bruce first showed up on stage during John Mellencamp's set. They performed together with Mellencamp's backing musicians a great version of "Wasted Days," one of the songs that Springsteen recorded with Mellencamp for Mellencamp's 2022 album Strictly A One-Eyed Jack. Last night's performance of "Wasted Days" marked the first time that Mellencamp and Springsteen publicly performed the song together. Later, Bruce opened his own set with another song he'd never performed live previously: a solo acoustic version of "Addicted to Romance," the song that he wrote for Rebecca Miller's film She Came To Me and recorded with Patti Scialfa. Although last night's version didn't include Patti's beautiful backing vocals or Bryce Dessner's orchestration, it remains such a heartwarming song at its core, so clearly it easily passed the "Does-it-work-with-just-a-guitar-and-a-voice?" test. He then followed up with yet another world-premiere live performance: "The Power of Prayer," from Letter To You. This double-shot of live premieres, both delivered strongly in such beautiful solo acoustic versions, raises hopes that material like this might make it into solo-acoustic or even full-band performances at least occasionally once Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band resume their tour next year. "Working On The Highway" and "Dancing In The Dark" closed the mini-set on an appropriately upbeat musical note (even if the lyrics of those songs aren't quite as upbeat as their music is.) At one point during "Dancing..." Bruce got a bit closer to his microphone than intended while doing the "I'm-going-off-mic-for-a-bit-to-sing-even-more-directly-to-you" move he perfected during Springsteen On Broadway. But other than that slight misstep, nothing major seems to have gotten in the way of making this a triumphant, exciting return to live performing for Springsteen, one that's filled with much potential and hope for both him and his fans. Fan-shot videos of all songs performed last night by Bruce Springsteen are below, presented in their chronological order of performance...and including, of course, all of those dirty jokes he also likes to tell each time he plays Stand Up For Heroes. (Hey, it is meant to be a night of comedy and music.) Finally, on a serious note, please click here for The Bob Woodruff Foundation's website, where you can donate to the Foundation and also connect for support if you're a veteran who needs it. Welcome back, Bruce!

October 30, 2023 Not surprisingly, the biggest highlight of this past Saturday's 50th Anniversary Of The Release Of The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Shuffle symposium, hosted by The Bruce Springsteen Archives & Center for American Music at Monmouth University, was that it marked the first time that Springsteen himself has participated in any Springsteen-focused symposium at Monmouth, before or after the Archives' formation. His onstage appearance wasn't announced officially or widely beforehand, though the Archives' Executive Director Robert Santelli teased and hinted at it earlier in the day, and the online agenda cryptically listed a 4:00-4:30 slot entitled "Writing the Songs: A Conversation with [Santelli and]…………………………" (A printed poster of the agenda, eventually displayed on Saturday only near the event's location at the University's Pollak Theatre, also confirmed Springsteen's appearance.) This probably was an extra-cautious and extra-smart move on the part of event organizers, given the possibility that Bruce's ongoing health/recovery issues might have prevented the appearance from happening. After all, why promise folks a Springsteen appearance and risk disappointing them if it can't occur, when you can just leave it unannounced and have everyone at the sold-out event be in a much more positive mood if and when it happens, without ever putting yourself in the position of having promised anything you didn't deliver? In any case, Bruce couldn't have shown up at a better time. Prior to his onstage appearance, despite the symposium having started seven hours earlier and having more than a few interesting segments, it still was surprising that overall there hadn't yet been that much actual in-depth discussion centered around The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Shuffle album itself, its creation, and (most important) its lasting significance as a work of art. Perhaps it could be seen as sort of inevitable when discussing the history behind an album in which one of its songs' more memorable lines is "Someday we'll look back on this and it will all seem funny," but symposium participant and longest-tenured E Street Band member Garry Tallent was only half-joking (at most) and got right to the heart of the matter when, at several points throughout the day, he repeatedly raised his unwillingness to over-romanticize that history. Part of the problem was that, unlike previous Springsteen-themed symposiums held at Monmouth, there was no time officially allotted for questions or comments from anyone in the audience. The decision to omit this kind of interaction (an interaction that is normally an essential element of any truly successful symposium) might have played a significant role in keeping unchallenged even some of the more dubious "tall-tale-"type pronouncements uttered onstage by some of the scheduled panelists and speakers (particularly one involving the late, great John Hammond and a stopwatch,) especially since no such challenges ever came from any of the onstage moderators. Here's hoping that the event organizers will reconsider this "no-questions-or-comments-from-the-audience" decision when planning future symposiums. Fortunately, once Springsteen arrived onstage, the in-depth discussion of The Wild, The Innocent, & The E Street Shuffle kicked into high gear...big time. He participated not only in a one-on-one sitdown with Santelli, but also in the panel-discussion that directly followed it, hosted by Springsteen on Sunday's Tom Cunningham, featuring Bruce interacting with the three surviving E Street Band members who recorded The Wild, The Innocent, & The E Street Shuffle with him: Vini Lopez, David Sancious, and Garry Tallent. A lot of what was said onstage (including Bruce's great story about skipping his high-school graduation ceremony to spend the day in New York City's Greenwich Village) also can be found in the The Wild, The Innocent, & The E Street Shuffle section of the 1998 book Songs, which was a collaboration between Springsteen and Santelli, and/or Chapters 14 and 27 of Springsteen's autobiography Born to Run. Nevertheless, there were some new wrinkles, selections of which have been transcribed below. (To see and hear - again or for the first time - everything that occurred onstage, just stick around for a few more years. As has happened with some previous events at Monmouth, the Springsteen Archives arranged to have all of this symposium filmed/recorded professionally, so that when its new building opens as planned, visitors will be able to watch and listen to such archival recordings on-demand.) Bruce Springsteen: "['Kitty's Back'] was a distorted piece of big-band jazz. I have no idea where it came from... I was interested at the time in writing these very sort of complex songs that move through a variety of different types of progressions, that had a lot of big jazz elements and soul elements in them. Also, I had to write things that were showstoppers, because people didn't know us at the time. We were opening up for a lot of strange acts. We opened up for Black Oak Arkansas... Brownsville Station... We were unknown, so I had these very dramatic, complex, but showstopping pieces of music. 'Rosalita' was one... 'Thundercrack' [an outtake from the album] was another... My intent was to write something that would just blow people down when we played it live. Why ['Thundercrack'] didn't get on the record... Really, what needed to happen was... I needed to [release] more records than I actually [did] at the time, because I had a lot of pretty good material. There's a nice version of it on TRACKS. That was our 'Good night, everybody!' showstopper." "When we went to [Asbury Park,] we thought we were going, like, to Barbados or something. It was so far away, and... there were these rides there, the beach. From Freehold, when you're a kid... ['Incident on 57th Street' and 'New York City Serenade'] were just sort of my romanticized visions of New York City. I wrote ['Incident...'] in Bradley Beach. 'New York City Serenade...' a lot of that record we improvised. We went to the studio; it had that one progression and a few changes, and Davey [Sancious,] of course, did that fantastic piano intro. It was just a groove we got into; it was pretty free and spontaneous... That album is very carny... 'E Street Shuffle,' 'Sandy,' even 'Wild Billy's Circus Story...' It was very much connected to the scene in Asbury Park on the street around the time of [now-defunct and now-legendary after-hours musicians' club] The Upstage... late sixties... early seventies. And I just sort of manifested stories from the locals that I knew, and people that were around... The thing I had all to myself at the time was the New Jersey thing. I remember going to San Francisco in 1969, and I went to the men's room at The Matrix. There was a guy at the urinal, nice to me, who said, 'Where ya from? You guys are pretty good!' I said, 'We're from New Jersey.' He said, 'What's that?!' Not 'Where is it?' ''What is it?!' So [with the album] I was trying to show what it is, y'know? And I was just very locked into that." "Luis Lahav, our engineer, is here. [Lahav traveled from his home in Israel for the symposium, and his wife Suki, who played and sang on the album and some of the tour dates that followed its release, appeared via a video-segment from one of Santelli's recently recorded oral histories for the Archives.] Luis, that record sounds great to this day, man... When you listen to it... all of the tube-amps and everything we used at that time; it was so authentic. I put it on today, and it sounds like a modern record. You did such a good job, Luis. Thank you." "[The album is] a lovely wild-card. It's a very youthful record, and it's me finally getting a chance to really express who I was, which I felt I didn't quite have the opportunity to do on the first album. All of my talents came to fruition: my ability to write lyrics, my ability to write evocative music to set cinematic scenes... Everything that I've basically done with the rest of my career really began on [this album.] It wasn't as stripped-down or as streamlined as Born to Run became, with the influence of Jon Landau... but it was a wonderful record that holds up tremendously well. I love just the eclecticness [sic] of it... all those horns, Davey's doing classical fill on 'New York City Serenade...' There's only seven songs on it, it's a lovely little record, and I'm still very proud of it." "[Vini Lopez] totally has his own style [of drumming.] The sounds that Luis and Mike got really made Vini's drum-style work on those [first two Springsteen albums.] It just worked; it was something that was totally his own and eccentric, but it worked on those records really well. When I go back to those records, I enjoy it tremendously." Vini Lopez on sharing a tent with Clarence Clemons on the grounds outside of 914 Sound Studios in Blauvelt, NY, where The Wild, The Innocent, & the E Street Shuffle was recorded, so the two financially struggling musicians could sleep close enough to where they worked without having to pay for a nearby hotel- or motel-room: "Clarence wanted to stay there... and we had the tent in the back. It was like the original Temple of Soul. It was funny. Nobody wanted to go in there but me and Clarence." Garry Tallent on his fondest memory related to the recording of the album: "[Several times when driving from home to the studio,] I got to bring John Hammond from Black Rock [nickname for The CBS Building in New York City] up to the studio because he wanted to visit... and [Springsteen's former manager and producer Mike Appel] called me, so I brought [Hammond] up with his car. It was about three times, but he had the greatest stories, so I just pumped him and asked him lots of questions. He probably got sick of it, but it was...the best part of the record for me..." David Sancious on the role of improvisation in developing his piano parts on the album: "Bruce gave me a lot of freedom, and I've always been able to improvise music. Basically you're composing in real time. So when you get good at that, and you kind of have to have a pretty broad harmonic sense, but once you get into it, to this day it surprises me what comes out when you improvise like that. So whatever I did, that was that day, y'know? It wasn't something that I thought a lot and said, 'Hmm, when I get back in the studio, I'll do this,' y'know? It just wasn't like that kind of energy. And thankfully, he really gave me this tremendous amount of freedom to come up with that." Bruce Springsteen: "Davey has never played anything bad. I don't know if he's capable of doing that, so it was always easy to give him free rein." Vini Lopez on the beautifully gentle cymbals-bass interplay that occurs between him and Garry Tallent four minutes into "Incident on 57th Street:" "That's another thing that just came about because it was that kind of a part in the song, and like Bruce said, you're looking for the best way to do the songs. Everybody wanted to be pleased themselves, too, with the song, the way it came out, y'know? And we were. At certain times, we came into that booth and listened back and said, 'Wow! We did THAT?!'" Bruce Springsteen: "You have to remember... We hadn't heard ourselves very much. In those days, to get yourself recorded, you either had to know somebody or have some money or... So we were really kinda hearing ourselves for the first or second time [with the first two Springsteen albums.] It was just an adventure." David Sancious on strumming the piano's strings at the beginning of "New York City Serenade:" "That's a technique I saw... There's a brilliant jazz pianist named Keith Jarrett. That's something that he used to do. He used to give entire concerts with just a grand piano on his own, and he would improvise a composition. His improvisations were so tight [that it sounded] like something that he wrote and worked on... but he would just be flowing... and he would do this thing occasionally. He would stand up, and it's a weird technique. You have to stand up and do it, and you have to hold down the chord on the piano, but not so hard that it sounds. So you just lift the dampers off the keys, and then you just stroke it like it's a dulcimer or something. It's not that easy to do. It's very delicate, because if you hold the chord down too hard, you hear the chord produced. I saw him do that and thought, 'Yeah, I can maybe do that.' It took me a minute to figure it out, but..." Bruce Springsteen: "It was a great intro. [imitating the sound of the strumming] Wonderful intro." Tom Cunningham: "Vini, there is a drum part in 'Rosalita' that only you know..." Vini Lopez: "Uh, I don't know about that." Tom Cunningham: "Can Max [Weinberg] play that part?" Vini: "Yeah." Bruce Springsteen: "Uh, absolutely not. Vini is being humble. I guarantee [Max] cannot. You cannot imitate the style of Vincent Lopez. It simply can't be done. And I gotta salute Garry; Garry kept up with him somehow." "[Recording the entire album] only took three months. It wasn't a long time, and it was the first record where we got involved in actually overdubbing...putting guitars and keyboards on after the rhythm track. There was a good amount of that, that we just started getting into." "I wanted to get [Richard Blackwell on the album.] When he slides his thumb across the top of that conga drum at the beginning of 'New York City Serenade,' it was a sound that I'd never heard before. [imitates the sound] And he also played on 'E Street Shuffle.' So it was nice having one of my old friends from Freehold there." "Mike [Appel] and [co-producer Jim Cretecos] and Luis... they got good sounds; they did a good job. I remember Mike, when I first went up to his office [to begin planning the album,] he said, 'Listen to this acoustic guitar.' And he played me Cat Stevens' 'Peace Train.' I said, 'That sounds great. That's a great-sounding record.' And when we went in [to the studio to begin recording,] Mike compressed the acoustic [guitar sound] in a way that was something similar. They just got good sounds. For that stage of the band, it was the perfect marriage." "The guys played great. We had played together for quite a while before [recording this album,] and hey, we were the best of Asbury Park at the time, y'know? The band was a tremendous sense of support, and their musicianship was tailored to what I was writing and then playing. They really tailored themselves to my music in a way that was totally unique. There weren't any other musicians who could have captured that sound like that at that moment... It's a real 'gumbo' record, a gumbo of so many different things, probably the most diverse record I've ever made, still to this day. It's a record that's a lot of fun." Appropriately, the symposium concluded with live performances of all seven songs from The Wild, The Innocent, & the E Street Shuffle, performed by various Jersey-based artists joined by Hall of Fame E Streeters Lopez, Sancious, and Tallent. And extra-appropriately, the album-sequence wasn't followed, instead placing those three "Good night, everybody!" showstoppers at the end of the set. After the music ended, and the audience began to file out of the Pollak Theatre, Santelli said that he hoped to see everyone again in 2025 for The Bruce Springsteen Archives and Center for American Music's 50th Anniversary Of The Release Of Born to Run symposium. That's definitely something to look forward to, of course, but here's hoping they don't fixate on just 50th anniversaries from now on. After all, in 2018 the Archives hosted a great 40th-anniversary symposium for Darkness on the Edge of Town, and next year a fairly popular Springsteen long-player entitled Born in the U.S.A. will hit its big 4-0 mark. Just sayin'... - Special thanks to Lisa Iannucci

November 4, 2023 Two E Street Band members - one past and one present - made significant appearances at last night's 2023 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony, held at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, NY. It was an historic induction ceremony, as not only was it the first ceremony to be streamed live in its entirety, but it also was the first to be held since Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Foundation board-member and legendary Rolling Stone publisher/editor Jann Wenner was removed from the board after making racist and sexist comments in a September New York Times interview. Last night's ceremony played out very much as a conscious, public response to the Wenner controversy, with a heightened focus on the contributions of African-American and female inductees, along with an appreciation of diversity embedded throughout the evening. Current E Street Band member Jake Clemons was the first member to appear onstage during the ceremony. Jake performed on saxophone in support of Miguel's performance of "Careless Whisper," part of the musical tribute to the late George Michael, who was inducted as part of the Hall's Class of 2023. And then there was Tom Morello, whose amazing guitar work graced the E Street Band during his many live shows as an official band-member in 2013 and 2014, and who also recorded the 2014 High Hopes album with Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band. (Springsteen himself had this to say about Morello's importance to that album, in its liner notes: "Tom and his guitar became my muse, pushing the rest of this project to another level. Thanks for the inspiration, Tom.") Morello was inducted into the Hall last night as a member of the groundbreaking, musically and politically revolutionary band Rage Against The Machine. Ice-T, another Los Angeles-based artist who, like Rage, brilliantly blurred the lines between hip-hop, metal, and radicalism in the early 1990s, delivered the induction speech, and spoke about how eager he was to do so. "Right out of the gate," he said, "Rage Against The Machine was not a game. And in their career, they did things that impressed cats like me. You can't impress me with normal stuff. You gotta impress me with stuff like... suing the U.S. State Department for using their music in Guantanamo Bay for torturing. Who does that?! Rage Against The Machine does that. Or how about 1993, pulling up in Lollapalooza buck-naked with duct tape, protesting against the PMRC. Who does that?! Rage Against The Machine does that. I respect the hell out of this band... but I love them. They're my brothers from L.A... I'm proud to introduce and induct Rage Against The Machine into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame." Morello, who was the only member of Rage Against The Machine present for last night's induction, had been seated in the audience at a table with Stevie Van Zandt. He then rose and walked to the stage to deliver a very passionate, heartfelt, and inspiring acceptance speech, which is transcribed in full here: My name is Tom Morello and I am one-quarter of Rage Against The Machine. I am deeply grateful for the musical chemistry I've had the good fortune to share with Brad Wilk, Tim Commerford, and Zack de la Rocha. Like most bands, we have differing perspectives on a lot of things, including about being inducted into the Rock Hall. My perspective is that tonight is a great opportunity to celebrate the music and the mission of the band, to celebrate with the fifth member of the band, and that is Rage Against The Machine's incredible fans. You're the reason we are here, and the best way to celebrate this music is for you to carry on that mission and that message. The lesson I've learned from Rage fans is that music can change the world. Daily, I hear from fans who've been affected by our music, and in turn have affected the world in significant ways. Organizers, activists, public defenders, teachers, the Presidents of Chile and Finland have all spent time in our mosh pit. When protest music is done right, you can hear a new world emerging in the songs, skewering the oppressors of the day, and hinting that there might be more to life than what was handed to us. Can music change the world? The whole fucking aim is to change the world, or at a bare minimum, to stir up a shitload of trouble! When Rage started, we rehearsed deep in the San Fernando Valley. This guy passed by our place regularly, and one day asked, "What are you guys doing in there?" We said, "We're a band." He asked to hear us, and we said, "Sure." He came in, sat down. Now this is the first guy to ever hear the music of Rage Against The Machine. We played him a couple of songs. After we finished, we asked him what he thought. He paused, stood up, and said, "Your music makes me wanna fight." Throughout history, the spark of rebellion has come from unexpected quarters: authors, economists, carpenters... But as Salvador Allende said, "There is no revolution without songs." So who's to say what musicians might or might not be able to achieve, with revolutionary intent, when the bouncing crowd makes the Richter scale shake? Personally, I'd like to thank my wife Denise and my kids who remind me daily that the world is worth fighting for. And thanks to all the musicians and changemakers who helped shape the band's collective vision. Rage has also been fortunate to have so many talented co-workers and co-conspirators who have believed in the band, from Michael Goldstone, the guy who signed us and insisted the first radio single be an unedited song featuring seventeen cuss words, to the greatest guitar tech of all time, Slim Richardson. Thank you, and thanks and deep appreciation to the hundreds of others, from those who put up flyers to those who have moved mountains to amplify the message and the music. What I hear in the music is this: that the world is not going to change itself. but throughout history, those who have changed the world in progressive, radical, or even revolutionary ways did not have any more money, power, courage, intelligence, or creativity than anyone watching tonight. The world's changed by average, everyday, ordinary people who have had enough, and are willing to stand up for a country and a planet that is more humane, peaceful, and just. And that is what I'm here to celebrate tonight. Fans often ask, "But what can I do?" Well, let's start with these three things: 1. Dream big, and don't settle, 2. Aim for the world you really want, without compromise or apology, and 3. Don't wait for us. Rage is not here, but you are. The job we set out to do is not over; now you're the ones that must testify. If you've got a boss, join a union. If you're a student, start an underground paper. If you're an anarchist, throw a brick. If you're a soldier or a cop, follow your conscience, not your orders. If you're bummed out you didn't get to see Rage Against The Machine, then form your own band and let's hear what you have to say. If you're a human being, stand up for your planet before it's too late. So tomorrow, crank up some Rage, and head out and confront injustice wherever it rears its ugly head. It's time to change the world, brothers and sisters, or at a bare minimum, to stir up a shitload of trouble! And finally, a special thanks to my mom, Mary Morello, a retired public high-school teacher, a proud Rage Against The Machine fan, and a lifelong radical who turned one-hundred years old a couple of weeks ago. She's watching at home tonight, but she asked me to tell you this... History, like music, is not something that happens. It's something you make. Thank you very much. The complete 2023 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony was recorded live and remains available for on-demand streaming in its entirety (and uncensored, to boot) at Disney+. Stay tuned for more coming soon from Letters To You on the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, the Jann Wenner controversy, and efforts to address the deeper, lingering issues behind it.

November 3, 2023 Lucinda Williams has triumphed over adversity time and again, and she proved it again last Sunday at the Count Basie Center for the Arts in Red Bank, NJ. It was the closing night of a brief tour she pulled together to showcase both her new record, Stories from a Rock n Roll Heart (which features backing-vocal contributions from both Bruce Springsteen and Patti Scialfa) and memoir, Don’t Tell Anybody the Secrets I Told You. She’d picked up a bit of a cough overnight, she said, but in truth, it was barely noticeable. Her unique and mellifluous voice was as transcendent as ever; it hits you in the gut, that ability to convey profound sorrow and yet also resilience and determination and empathy. Williams, on a recovery journey after a stroke suffered in 2020, was guided onstage by a member of her road crew; she moved slowly, haltingly, to her location center stage, where a barstool chair and small table were placed. She was welcomed with a standing ovation. Wearing a black Runaways t-shirt and her trademark black leather jacket and jeans, Lucinda remained her warm, folksy self for most of the evening, making self-deprecating comments about her tendency to ramble - especially on the subject of Southern cuisine - during her onstage raps. She also explained that she would not be playing guitar due to her physical challenges; this was just a “temporary setback,” she said with a smile. Supported by her stellar band Buick 6, Williams performed several songs while standing, but was seated for most of the evening; the process of being seated or standing up required some crew assistance that took several minutes each time. During these pauses, both band and audience waited in respectful silence except for the occasional shout of support, and all treated her with gentle kindness and respect. It was a slow-moving, carefully planned and executed show that demanded attention, and she got it, as the audience mostly sat in respectful silence throughout. This was not a traditional rock’n’roll show, though; rather, it was a reflective performance that told the story of her life through her songs, which were introduced by brief comments that placed each one in context. The story of her life was also told through video and still images projected behind the band as each song was performed; moody, mostly black and white, the presentation included both family photos and home movies as well as images and music videos that illustrated some of the themes of the material. As a whole, the entire event was so deeply personal that at times, it felt as though you were sitting in her living room rather than in a theater. Each song in the carefully chosen set list represented a specific time in her life and career and often a musical influence as well. The show opened with “Blind Pearly Brown,” a new, as yet unrecorded ode to a vagabond blues musician whom she had seen performing on the streets of Macon, Georgia as a young girl. Holding her father’s hand, Williams recalled in the song’s introduction, she stood transfixed by the raw emotion and pathos of this Black preacher, blind since birth, who although he was a celebrated musician who had once made a record, was forced to make his meager living busking for money. The narrator’s heart seemingly breaks as she relates that the reverend often lamented how people could be so cruel to a poor Black man just trying to survive. The simple tale of a neglected and all but forgotten early influence, “Blind Pearly Brown” was followed by her cover of Elizabeth Cotten’s “Freight Train,” a starkly beautiful folk song that effortlessly conveys the invisible weight borne by Black sharecroppers and itinerant workers as they struggle to make their way in the harsh physical and social landscape of the Depression-era South. These two plainspoken songs, performed in Williams’ empathetic, soulful soprano, hit like a one-two gut punch that left the audience in stunned silence. Indeed, mortality was a central theme of the evening, as friends, colleagues and family who had passed from her life were memorialized in a quartet of songs dealing with death and loss: “Pineola,” written for a colleague of her father, poet and academic Miller Williams; “Lake Charles,” which mourns the loss of an early romantic partner; “Drunken Angel,” an ode to the late Austin musician Blaze Foley; and “Little Angel, Little Brother,” a character sketch of her younger brother, from whom she’s been estranged for some time. There is death and heartache and loss in everyone’s life – it’s part of being human. But there are few artists who can illuminate the pain of such experiences in such simple yet profound language. It’s a remarkable feat. Her reverential discussion of Bob Dylan and subsequent performance of his “It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry” was also noteworthy, given the vast and diverse array of influences she’s cited over the years. Perhaps he was provided the space in the set because like Lucinda, he has also had a brush with death, and despite being ten years older, is not only still touring, but is himself releasing some of the best material of his career and putting together thoughtful and engaging performances of his own. The detailed structure of the show made it easy to see the through line from her life on the road, the time spent looking through the windows of her tour bus at the passing scenery, to where her career has landed. Her 2016 double album, The Ghosts of Highway 20, was inspired by such trips down that “blues highway” and through the southland of her youth, during which she recalled many of the scenes later depicted throughout that record and in “Blind Pearly Brown.” The evening was not a completely mournful road trip through Williams’ life, however; following “Freight Train,” there was a bright, upbeat performance of Hank Wiliams’ “Jambalaya,” and the urgent desire of “Righteously” got the audience on its feet to round out the night. However, in keeping with the overall zeitgeist of the evening, the main set ended in a reflective mood, with “Where the Song Will Find Me,” a lovely, lyrical rumination on the creative process and “Rock n Roll Heart,” her triumphant statement of purpose. (The latter was introduced with a brief thanks to Bruce Springsteen and Patti Scialfa, who, to her apparent surprise, contributed vocals to the album track.They were nowhere near the Jersey Shore that evening to accept her thanks, however, as Scialfa’s induction into the New Jersey Hall of Fame was taking place in Newark that same night.) If there was a bone to be picked in this memorable evening, it was perhaps the omission of earlier, noteworthy material like “Six Blocks Away” and “Passionate Kisses,” which may have been more suitable encore material. But that was insignificant next to the power and mastery of Williams’ otherworldly, unforgettable performance in Red Bank. Bob Dylan, take heed - Lucinda has still got it, too.

October 31, 2023 Hmm... That Jersey Devil pictured above looks VERY familiar, doesn't he? He definitely reminds us of someone, but we'll be damned (to eternity?) if we know exactly who that'd be. Oh, well; Happy Halloween, everyone, and watch out for The Jersey Devil, who - as the grave-marker in the above photo notes - has been known to haunt not just New Jersey but, beginning in 1909, Letters To You's home state of Pennsylvania (and its home county of Delaware County, even,) along with many other parts unknown since then. In fact, he just might be visiting YOUR neck of the woods this very evening...

October 31, 2023 Below is The New Jersey Hall of Fame's Facebook reel of official pro-shot video highlights from last Sunday night's 15th Annual Induction Ceremony, including - beginning at the 11:44 mark - complete video of Patti Scialfa's induction (her second induction, officially, as we reported previously,) with Bruce Springsteen's full induction speech followed by Scialfa's Hall of Fame bio-video and her full acceptance speech. Immediately after all of that is the evening's concluding musical number. The house band performed the Joe Cocker arrangement of The Beatles' "With A Little Help From My Friends," eventually joined by Patti Scialfa, Bruce Springsteen, Stevie Van Zandt (who was there to induct Sopranos creator David Chase,) and... I can't believe I see... fellow Hall of Famer Tony Orlando singing right along with them! Our friend Jay Lustig at NJArts.net also has posted transcriptions of both Bruce's and Patti's speeches. Click here to read them, and click here to read Jay's transcription of Stevie Van Zandt's induction speech for David Chase.

October 31, 2023 Bruce Springsteen has just announced 22 tour-dates for his 2024 return to Europe with the E Street Band. They are as follows: May 5 – Cardiff, Wales @ Principality Stadium (On-sale: Friday, Nov. 3 at 10am*) May 9 – Belfast, Northern Ireland @ Boucher Road (On-sale: Monday, Nov. 6 at 8am*) May 12 – Kilkenny, Ireland @ Nowlan Park (On-sale: Monday, Nov. 6 at 8am*) May 16 – Cork, Ireland @ Páirc Uí Chaoimh (On-sale: Monday, Nov. 6 at 8am*) May 19 – Dublin, Ireland @ Croke Park (On-sale: Monday, Nov. 6 at 8am*) May 22 – Sunderland, England @ Stadium of Light (On-sale Friday, Nov. 3 at 10am*) May 25 – Marseille, France @ Orange Vélodrome (On-sale Tuesday, Nov. 7 at 10am*) May 28 – Prague, Czech Republic @ Airport Letnany (On-sale Friday, Nov. 3 at 10am*) June 1 – Milan, Italy @ San Siro Stadium (On-sale Monday, Nov. 6 at 12pm*) June 3 – Milan, Italy @ San Siro Stadium (On-sale Monday, Nov. 6 at 12pm*) June 12 – Madrid, Spain @ Cívitas Metropolitano (On-sale Tuesday, Nov. 7 at 10am*) June 14 – Madrid, Spain @ Cívitas Metropolitano (On-sale Tuesday, Nov. 7 at 10am*) June 20 – Barcelona, Spain @ Estadi Olímpic (On-sale Tuesday, Nov. 14 at 10am*) June 27 – Nijmegen, Netherlands @ Goffertpark (On-sale Friday, Nov. 3 at 9am*) July 2 – Werchter, Belgium @ Werchter Park (On-sale Friday, Nov. 3 at 10am*) July 5 – Hannover, Germany @ Heinz von Heiden Arena (On-sale Wednesday, Nov. 8 at 10am*) July 9 – Odense, Denmark @ Dyrskuepladsen (On-sale Thursday, Nov. 2 at 10am*) July 12 – Helsinki, Finland @ Olympic Stadium (On-sale Monday, Nov. 6 at 11am*) July 15 – Stockholm, Sweden @ Friends Arena (On-sale Friday, Nov. 3 at 10am*) July 18 – Stockholm, Sweden @ Friends Arena (On-sale Friday, Nov. 3 at 10am*) July 21 – Bergen, Norway @ Dokken (On-sale Monday, Nov. 6 at 10am*) July 25 – London, England @ Wembley Stadium connected by EE (On-sale Friday, Nov. 3 at 10am*) *All on-sale times are local time For further information, including links to purchase tickets online, please click here to visit the "Tour" page at Bruce Springsteen's official website.

October 27, 2023 Congratulations to "The First Lady of Love," Ms. Patti Scialfa, who will be inducted again into The New Jersey Hall of Fame this Sunday night. She first was inducted in 2012 as a member of the E Street Band, when the entire band got inducted. On Sunday she will join fellow E Streeters Stevie Van Zandt (who was re-inducted in 2017) and Max Weinberg (who was re-inducted in 2022) on the extra-short-list of twice-inducted E Street Band members. Scialfa recently spoke with Chris Jordan from The Asbury Park Press about her upcoming induction. “I’m super-flattered,” she told Jordan. “You look at the list of inductees and it’s quite illustrious, so you're going, 'Oh my gosh!' I’m a little overwhelmed with imposter syndrome right now.” Patti also explained why she was not part of the band lineup during most of Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band's 2023 tour, which led to some speculation and concern among fans. “I didn’t feel as needed in a way because there were a lot of musicians on stage,” she said, while also noting that she'll be on stage again when the tour resumes in 2024. “I did the first couple of shows, and as I saw how it was all rolling, I thought, 'This is good. This is completely intact. There’s not much room for me to add anything special.' And the main thing was I have a record that I couldn’t have finished when Bruce was home because he’s in the studio all the time. So I took that opportunity to do my record." The new record, her fourth album, will be released next year, as well. The time away from touring also allowed her to spend some extra time with her first grandchild, Lily Harper, the daughter of Bruce's and Patti's son Sam and his wife, Alex Reph. Click here to read Chris Jordan's Asbury Park Press article "Patti Scialfa talks NJ Hall of Fame induction, performing with Springsteen, E Street Band" in its entirety. And congrats again to the red-headed, rumble-doll Hall of Famer.