Southeastern Theater Conference Keynote

I am going to being part of the exciting Southeastern Theater Conference next week delivering a talk called "The Warrior and The Fool: Being an Artist in These Hard Times".  Check out the conference here: https://www.facebook.com/setc.org

Lots of workshops and speeches, lots of opportunities too.  I'm looking forward to hearing Eric Booth, and seeing Steve Wangh.

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Memphis, Clarksdale, the blues...

Clarksdale, Mississippi is said to be mecca of the blues, and judging by the pilgrims who come here from around the world it just might be.  Tonight at Red's there were folks from 10 states and as far away as Australia, and last time there were people from Japan, France, Germany, and Canada...something about the blues that speaks across borders, across languages, and into the stuff.

Tonight I heard "Kingfisher", a 14 year-old guitar wizard, not for flashy licks, but for deep knowing, solid feel, and soulful maturity well beyond his years.  Couldn't help but think that this kid possesses a wisdom from somewhere else...that kind of musicianship and soul just can't be conjured in such little time...wondered about where it came from, whether it is inborn, whether it comes from someplace, from someone.  Clarksdale is the place of the crossroads where Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil in exchange for his musical talent.  Kingfisher has so much mojo I wonder if that spell is alive and well in this town.

There's a juke joint festival down here April 12 and 13, get here if you can.  Stay at Hobson's Plantation, drink cheap beer, open your ears, and prepare yourself for gritty transformation in the kettle of the blues.  JUKE JOINT FESTIVAL WEBSITE

SAVE THE DATE: Imagination, Inquiry and Innovation Institute Conference

Acceptance speech from International Performing Arts for Youth (IPAY)

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International Performing Arts for Youth

Lifetime Achievement Award

David Gonzalez' Acceptance Speech

January 2011

The fairy tale just took a twist. 

I’ve traded cows for beans, I’ve made wishes to magical fishes, I’ve negotiated with beasts and fairies, I’ve slain, and (like Sondheim’s storyteller), I’ve been slain, I’ve risen from the ashes, yes, like you, I’ve journeyed into the wood, and now, miraculously, by your good graces, I am home safe and crowned.

Robin, June, Bert, my esteemed colleagues and friends we all know this could easily be you. I am humbled to be standing here before you, and in the spirit of our community I accept the Mickey Miners award in the name of the unsung, the unknown, the worker bees behind the scenes, the ones who aren’t with us today, who taught us, who fought with us against the tide, who wouldn’t abide the facile or docile, yes, to the nameless tributaries, and to the as yet unborn future artists that will nourish the values of art we hold dear.

In a recent interview I was asked about the choice to be an artist.  What compels someone to commit ourselves to this absurdly uncertain, and certainly absurd, road? It is a wonder that so many of us actually take the detour and get “off the grid” when so many viable possibilities, alternatives and conventions surround us. Yes, sometimes it is ego pure and simple, but we all know that that is rare, and mostly passing. The truth is, while each of us has a story, at the root of that story is the overwhelming necessity to matter to the world, to make a difference in young people’s lives, however small, through our capacity to imagine, to create, and to wonder.

I was seven years old in 1963 when I heard on a little brown transitor radio that President Kennedy had been shot, I watched his funeral on TV, the black horse-drawn wagon mournfully carrying his body down Pennsylvannia Avenue, John-John’s tiny salute…With my grandmother I watched the news every night, we adjusted the rabbit-eared antenae to still the image to see the water cannons blasting black protesters in Newark, and Watts, I saw the funerals of Martin Luther King Jr, of Bobby Kennedy, and I saw the body bags coming home from Viet Nam day after day, the daily tally of US dead, of Vietcong dead.  I saw much but could do nothing.  These images were the cradle of my consciousness – how could I stand by, how can anyone stand by passively when the fires of hatred and war are raging all around us.  I root the answer as to why I do what I do to the dissonance between my youthful innocence and the troubled times I was born into.  

And that is my question today -- Is there enough outrage?  Why were 23 Afghan civilians killed by a U.S. drone last week?  Why is Bradley Manning in solitary confinement, looking at 52 years in prison? Why did we allow the administration to suppress the photos of our dead returning home from Iraq and Afganistan for so long?  No, we oughtn’t pound politics into kid’s heads, but neither should we keep them ignorant of their world. 

In closing may I ask that our work invigorate the imagination, liberate free thought, embody true joy, and help create an activated citizenry that will respond with loud voices against injustice so that no more innocents be killed in our name, and so that the masks, and truths, of tragedy and comedy be friendly companions to our days.

Thank you.