Post tag: Marlowsphere Blog
“Creative Resilience” by Erica Ginsberg, A Book for All Artists

The Marlowsphere (Blog #160)

Once in a while you pick up a book, start reading it and quickly realize there’s deep value, the voice of pragmatic experience, wisdom, and guidance in between the front and back covers. Such a book is Erica Ginsberg’s Creative Resilience: Reclaiming Your Power as an Artist (Bold Story Press, 2023).

Whatever aspect of the fine and performing arts you’re in, whether you are a fulltime artist making your living through your artistic practice or an “amateur” for which art is a sideline or something in between, Creative Resilience is a must for your bedside reading before the lights go out, or sitting on a beach, or resting in a hammock, or having with you to refer to while you’re creating your art.

In a way, the book’s sub-title is misleading. It presumes on some level the reader is someone who has lost the power of making art. Ginsberg’s book touches anyone in the world of the fine and performing arts, whether you’re active or licking your wounds from too much rejection. Once you get into two or three chapters you will recognize yourself in the words, paragraphs, and pages regardless of what stage of artistic life you are experiencing. Creative Resilience is for the beginner, the artist at the middle stage of a career, or someone at the height of their skills and powers.

Certainly, this is not the first book to deal with the emotionally fraught issues of making art and failure and/or success. Several books have preceded this one, among them:

  • Art & Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking
    by David Bayles and Ted Orland
  • The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles
    by Steven Pressfield
  • Creative Confidence: Unleashing the Creative Potential Within Us All
    by Tom Kelley and David Kelley
  • Fail, Fail Again, Fail Better: Wise Advice for Leaning into the Unknown
    by Pema Chödrön
  • The Success Principles: How to Get from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be
    by Jack Canfield
  • Art Is the Highest Form of Hope & Other Quotes by Artists
    by Phaidon Editors

Art and Fear and The War of Art are two of the earlier books Ginsberg references in an appendix at the end of her book. What distinguishes Erica Ginsbergher work, however, is its presentation style in words and organization. Each of her 23 chapters are short and easily digested. This book could be absorbed in one sitting. There’s also an element of interactivity. At the end of each chapter is a “Creative Check-In,” where Ginsberg provides the reader with an opportunity to reflect on the content of the chapter and essentially prods the reader to reflect on and apply what has just been read to the reader’s own “artistic” life.

Her choice of language is straight forward and clear. She quotes other artists who were especially interviewed for the book. She quotes many other artists who are well-known and some not so well known. Regardless, throughout you always have the feeling Ms. Ginsberg knows whereof she speaks, that she has experienced everything she talks about, that her advice and encouragements come from a wealth of struggle, failure, pain, revision, reframing, success, and personal and artistic growth.

Creative Resilience is one of those volumes that should be on every artist’s bookshelf to be read and re-read at least once a year, or at least referred to from time to time regardless of artistic failure or success. It covers a lot of bases regarding the fragile world of art making. It’s the kind of book you can cozy up to and feel as if someone is talking to you like an understanding friend.

Eugene Marlow, MBA, Ph.D. is himself an active artist: composer, arranger, musician, journalist, author, producer, documentarian, and educator.

Eugene Marlow, MBA, Ph.D., © 2024

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Charlie Smalls Remembered

The Marlowsphere (Blog #159)

The Wiz Playbills Then & Now The Broadway-bound revival of “The Wiz,” a re-telling of the 1900 L. Frank Baum classic with an African American cast, began previews on March 29, 2024, at the Marquis Theatre ahead of an April 17 opening night. No, this isn’t a public relations piece about the show that premiered 50 years ago. This is a blog about my memories of the show’s composer and lyricist, Charlie Smalls.

I’m able to write with some authority about Charlie Smalls because I knew him, not just casually, but over a period of several years. We were classmates at The High School of Performing Arts at 120 West 46th Street in Manhattan, just blocks away from Broadway. We were both in the same homeroom. He was a music major. I was a drama major, with strong leanings toward music.

Charlie was clearly an exceptionally talented musician and, as it turns out, a talented composer and lyricist. His ability to write lyrics was a surprise to me when I learned in 1975 about the opening of this Broadway show called ‘The Wiz,” but I was not surprised about his Charlie Smalls inscription to Eugene Marlow in Marlow's yearbook.composing skills. Even in high school Charlie was already a player at a professional level. In fact, not only did he play the piano, but he also studied the upright acoustic bass.

I’m quite certain Charlie helped put me on the road to composing jazz pieces. There was a piano in our homeroom and he was often sitting at the piano just noodling around. I don’t recall if he ever taught me anything specific about jazz chords or structure, but I am certain that as a result of our casual meetings at the homeroom piano I was inspired to compose my very first piece at age 15 — a blues in C minor that had classical arpeggio gestures and moved from c minor to C Major and back to c minor. I also used a major ninth chord in the opening theme (although I couldn’t name it at the time). Many years later I named it “Nightcap.” Even more years later virtuoso pianist ArcoIris Sandoval recorded it, with multi-Grammy nominee drummer Bobby Sanabria, and bassist Frank Wagner for one of my albums.

Did I learn the blues from Charlie? Hard to say. I could barely read music—even though my father was a professional violinist and a composer who introduced me to jazz at a jazz jamboree in London, England when I was around eight years old. Consequently, I also didn’t know how to write music down. This was a skill I acquired years later.

Charlie was a presence. He had a big smile and a big personality. You knew he was in the room. He was talented. And he was a good soul. He Charlie Smalls dancing during the GOPA music broadcastwas no wallflower. Every day at midday the entire school of 600 students had a lunch break. During the second half of this period, we had what was called GOPA: the Government Organization of Performing Arts where music was played over the public address system that reached everyone in the school’s lobby area. There was also a lunchroom on the same floor and when the  music blared over the GOPA system, we all danced in the center of the lobby floor. And we loved it! And so did Charlie. Not only did he program and announce the music played from the vinyl records, Charlie was also on the floor in the thick of the dancing throng. It only lasted 20-30 minutes, but this was everyone’s chance to let off some steam from the pressures of the schoolwork. Performing Arts demanded a professional attitude at all times, or you were out!

There are two other things I recall from my memory of Charlie. In my senior year I took on the task of writing and directing the senior show. This was an annual tradition in which the outgoing seniors “roasted” the staff and faculty. The show was called “A Lass in PlAy Land.” It was a rip-off of the plot of “Alice in Wonderland” There was a drama Alice (played by Jennifer Salt), a dance Alice (played by Baayork Lee), and a music Alice (played by Stephanie Dank). Each Alice represented each of the school’s majors. Charlie was my first call when it came time to add music and a trio ensemble into the performance mix. He handled the assignment with ease (no pun intended).

As an aside, you might recognize the names Jennifer Salt and Baayork Lee. Jennifer was the daughter of Waldo Salt (screenwriter of “Midnight Cowboy”) and an excellent writer in her own right. She went on to star in movies and television (e.g., “Soap”) and as a writer for television. Baayork was one of the original cast members of “A Chorus Line” and went on to work with director Michael Bennett as his assistant. She is now in charge of “A Chorus Line” worldwide.

The other memory I have of Charlie is he called me one afternoon after we had graduated and urged me to go down to a club in The Village in Manhattan to listen to a comedian. I had never heard of this comedian, but I trusted Charlie’s judgment. That comedian was Richard Pryor. I remember standing at the back of this smallish club listening to Pryor’s patter. I didn’t understand a word of what he said or why he was saying it. But it was clear how he was saying it was highly engaging and compelling.

Charlie Small yearbook inscription to Eugene MarlowIn my yearbook Charlie wrote: “Keep writing. Stay in the groove because I want to be on my way to see your new B’way hit some time soon. Don’t fail me!” He signed it “Mr. Cool Charlie.” By “writing” I’m sure he meant composing.

Of course, 14 years after we graduated from Performing Arts “The Wiz” opened on Broadway with music and lyrics by Charlie Smalls. He had created a 7-time Tony-winning “hit” show. In the 14 intervening years between graduation and the opening of “The Wiz” I was busy earning two college degrees, serving six years in the United States Air Force during the height of the Vietnam War, then working as a news editor for the leading trade magazine in mass merchandizing, and finally starting a career in video and radio production. Events—personal, professional, and external–took us in different directions. Music, though, one way or another, has been my constant shadow companion.

L to R: Unidentified man, Charlie Smalls (Composer/Lyricist), William F. Brown (Book) and Ken Harper (Producer) during rehearsals for the stage production “The Wiz” photo: NYPL Digital CollectionsCharlie died young, much too young. He was 43 and performing in Belgium when he suffered a burst appendix and died from cardiac arrest in the process. I’ve seen photos of him decades after he graduated from Performing Arts. He smoked and perhaps this was a contributing cause. Don’t know. He had a son whom I’d like to meet.

Either way, Charlie was no small talent. He created an enduring musical work that was morphed into a movie in 1978 and is now enjoying a Broadway revival. There’s no doubt in my mind Charlie Smalls played a brief but pivotal role in my own, long, challenging journey to embracing and realizing my innate musical talent.

I wish I had kept up with him. He was the real deal.


Eugene Marlow, MBA, Ph.D., received the John Golden Award for Excellence in the Creative Theatre when he graduated from The High School of Performing Arts. To date, he has composed over 300 musical works in various jazz, Afro-Caribbean, Brazilian, and classical genres. Four of his charts for big band appear on four Grammy nominated albums. He has released 33 albums and single tracks on his indie label, MEII Enterprises.

Eugene Marlow, MBA, Ph.D., © 2024

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Syurpriz! 100 Years of Russian Jazz: The Documentary

"Jazz 100 Russia" documentary posterThe Marlowsphere (Blog #157)

When it comes to documentaries where the subject is jazz, the American catalogue is full of viewing choices, so much so you come away with the impression that jazz is only performed in the United States and if it is performed elsewhere on the planet, well, how good could it be? If it was created and performed on a par with American jazz composers, arrangers, and musicians, well, then, certainly documentaries would be a lot more present.

Syurpriz! That’s Russian for “Surprise!” According to a recently released feature-length  documentary (114 minutes) produced in Russia, jazz has been performed in Russia (more surprise) for 100 years!

The documentary—“Jazz 100 Russia”—was the brainchild of renowned Russian tenor saxophonist Igor Butman (he’s also one of the characters in the documentary as well as one of the producers, along with Yulia Hmelevskaya).

Cyril Moshkow Russian Jazz JournalistIt was written by Russia’s leading jazz journalism Cyril Moshkow. The director is Alexander Bryntsev. The documentary’s major sponsor is the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation.

The documentary calls itself “groundbreaking” and it is that. It’s the first documentary to encapsulate the 100 years of jazz in Russia, starting with the introduction of jazz by (syupriz) an innovative dancer, Valentin Parnakh, who brought the jazz sound and aesthetic to Russia from his visits to Paris in the early 1920s.

Second, the six-part feature is a cornucopia of archival footage that no doubt took years of specific and serendipitous research.

Third, along with the archival footage, the soundtrack is wall-to-wall jazz of various stripes paralleling the evolution of jazz in the United 1935 Alksandr Tsfasman Band in Early Soviet TalkieStates, from “trad jazz” to “free jazz” to today’s contemporary styles. This, too, must have required painstaking research.

Fourth, the documentary does not shy away from dealing with the political lefts and rights in Russia since the 1917 Russian Revolution, although the references are subtle and non-critical.

The 100-year span of Russian jazz history brought together in 114 minutes is in itself a work of art: gorgeously shot and edited so well the viewer does not notice the content juxtapositions. It tells a story of not just the jazz players, but also the social and cultural backdrop in which this democratic form of music through improvisation ─ and therefore individual freedom of expression ─ as survived and grown in a country with a long history of adherence to central authority.

1959 Moscow Jazz Club Backstage Rehearsal, photo (c)Vladimir SadkovkinSpeaking of improvisation, one of the best definitions of jazz is articulated by Evgeny Pobozhiy, the young winner of the 2019 Herbie Hancock Jazz Guitar Competition. He says:

[Jazz] is the most perfect musical form that humans have created. Jazz culture
has absorbed the best achievements of humanity: Western traditions and oriental
ethnic traditions, and African, of course. It is based on improvisation, that is, on
spontaneous music-making, and improvisation is impossible without deep knowledge
and understanding. A jazz musician has always been something like a symbiosis of a
creator and a scientist, both involved in a certain spiritual practice.

Well stated. Just like the documentary.

The documentary will become available outside Russia after it has been shown on Russian television. Click here to see the trailer.

Eugene Marlow, Ph.D.
Producer/Director/Writer
“Jazz in China” Winner of the 2022 Free Speech Film Festival

Eugene Marlow, MBA, Ph.D., © 2023

 

 

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Part I: “It’s Suffocating” When Young Women From South East Asia Hit A Cultural Wall

Marlowsphere (Blog #154)

Pakistan, literacy, Women, IndependenceQuestion: 

What happens when a young person, especially a young female person from a conservative South East Asia family and country, comes to study at a college in the United States where the values concerning male and female roles, dating and marriage are out of step with the more liberal values surrounding male and female roles, dating and marriage in many American colleges?

Answer:

They hit a cultural wall, not necessarily with their new found student peers, but with their own family and country-of-origin traditions.

It is a difficult and stressful situation for the female student. On the one hand, the female student wants to do well and achieve a higher learning status. On the other hand, the parents, especially the fathers, are more concerned about marrying the daughter off, regardless of the daughter’s intellectual potential and prowess. It is a about individual freedom of expression vs. adherence to entrenched adherence to hundreds, perhaps thousands of years of immovable cultural traditions.

This cultural conflict of values—essentially a double standard: one for male and one for female with South Asian backgrounds—was brought home to me late last year when one of my students who is Pakistani approached me seeking help with this familiar story. It is made worse by the context of the pandemic. Many people from this region of the world believe the COVID-19 vaccine is for controlling people.

There is a strong correlation between these “beliefs” and illiteracy. Pakistan—a nuclear-armed nation—has a literacy rate of about 62 percent—out of 227 million people. This means millions of Pakistanis are illiterate, especially women. Innovation, for example, in Pakistan is very low. Little is invested in education.

What follows is the interview I conducted with this student. Her name has been changed to “female student” (and abbreviated to FS:) to protect her from possible harmful consequences meted out by her parents or her cultural community.


“I went back to Pakistan and there were many people who think the vaccine is there to kill people, to depopulate the world.”To Vaccinate or Not To Vaccinate

EM:  Let’s start with the story you were telling me a few weeks ago about your family and their response to vaccination mandates.

FS: It’s all about the fake news and the people. People in my family look more to the videos on YouTube and they believe those stories. For example, some of my relatives came from Pakistan two months ago.  We tried to convince them to be vaccinated, but they were hesitant because they believed the vaccine had a chip in it and then it could get injected in our bodies and they can control us and we won’t have any control over our minds. It was frustrating because the situation is getting worse and their son was also sick. We tried to convince them, but they were adamant that the vaccine is not good.

Last summer (2021), I went back to Pakistan and there were many people who think the vaccine is there to kill people, to depopulate the world.  They had that firm belief. Even if we tried to convince them that we are vaccinated and nothing has happened to us and they will be fine too, they say, “No, we don’t believe you.”

I realized then it’s not only word-of-mouth that shapes their beliefs on the vaccine but also social media. YouTube especially has very much more to do with it.

My father follows a YouTube channel called Haqeeqat TV. The host just posts a video on YouTube talking randomly about anything and none Haqeeqat TVof his claims make sense. For example, when we got infected by COVID last year, my mother was in hospital. Her condition was very serious. We were sitting in the living room and my father clicked on the video and that host was saying “There is no COVID. There is nothing like that, it’s just propaganda to shut down the world. America is fine. Nothing is happening there.  People are living their lives. It is just us [in Pakistan] who are suffering because of it.” My father wasn’t convinced that guy’s claims were false!

EM:  Are you vaccinated?

FS:  Yeah, I’m vaccinated.  My whole family—father, mother, two brothers—is now vaccinated.

EM:  The relatives that came from Pakistan, they were not vaccinated.

FS:  Yeah, they were not vaccinated.  Do you remember that I told you that I skipped two classes because I found out my friend tested positive and I maybe I was having symptoms and I wanted to get tested?  When I told these relatives that I think I am COVID positive too, they were kind of scared. What I did is scare them more. Then they said they should get vaccinated.

EM:  What part of Pakistan does your family come from?

FS:  Punjab.

“. . . it is common for girls that if they get married then they aren’t allowed to continue their education.”Finish Your Degree So We Can Get You Married

EM:  Please tell me the story about your friend who was about to turn 21 and her father wanted to send her back to Pakistan to get married, so she’s hurrying up to finish her college.

FS: One day when we were discussing about majors and she said, “I’m an accounting major.” She said she was taking summer and winter classes. She was trying to finish college early. I asked her, “why?” She said that “My parents will get me married soon so I don’t want my degree left unfinished.” I was shocked at that time. I thought “Your husband won’t allow you to study if you get married? That is why you are hurrying up?” She was hesitant. She didn’t really reply. She is going to turn 20 in January 2022. She is hoping to complete her bachelor’s degree by 2023. It isn’t clear that she is facing pressure from her family, that she won’t be able to finish her degree after she gets married.

I do know some people from Pakistan where it is common for girls that if they get married then they aren’t allowed to continue their education. Or if they’re working, they aren’t allowed to continue their job. I tried to talk to her about that later too, but she didn’t respond.

EM:  Are you facing a similar situation or is it different with your family?

FS:  In my situation, there is no pressure that I wouldn’t be able to continue my studies. My father, however, wants me to get married after I graduate and he wants me to marry in 2024 or 2025.

I don’t want to get married so early because for me, my age should be 26 or 27 to get married. I believe I will be more responsible and more ready then to get into marriage. I disagree with my father. He thinks you should get your children married at a certain age, for example, 22 or 23.  He is adamant.  He talks about it every day. “Once you graduate, I want you to get married,” he says.

It’s Not the Same for Boys

Men on Motorcycle, Lhore, Punjab, PakistanEM:  Is it the same for your brothers?

FS:  I don’t think so. My brothers are young.  One is three years younger than me. The other is six years younger than me.  One is going to get into college and the other just entered high school.  I’m about to finish my college.

I don’t think they’re going to have the situation like I am. I realized this a month ago.  My f was in a relationship with a Pakistani girl.  He hid that relationship from all of us, but then we went to Pakistan and he told one of my cousins about it who told everyone my brother was in a relationship with a girl.

My mother got to know about it. I was not shocked because I was expecting this because of the kind of behavior he showed.  But I wasn’t as shocked as my mother was. He had normal behavior, but we really didn’t know how my father was going to react. My father was here [in the U.S.] when we were in Pakistan so when we came back, my mother told him.  He didn’t react well.  He just shoved it off.

EM:  So, it’s different for boys?

FS:  Yeah, it’s different for boys.

The next thing I’m going to tell you is much worse. The girl my brother had this relationship with is also from Pakistan, from Punjab.  Her parents eventually learned about the relationship, here’s how. Let me tell you about her brother. Her brother is a college freshman. He has a lot of girlfriends. You could call him a playboy. Everyone knows about it in his house, even his father, his mother, his sisters. He has one girlfriend that he introduced to his parents, his family. But when that boy catches his sister in the relationship with my brother! What he does he do now? He tells this to his parents.

My brother’s girlfriend faces the wrath of her parents. They come to our house and they threaten my mother, my father. My brother was in school. I was in college. They talk to my father and say “Tell your son never to contact our daughter again.” My father was much calmer “I realized what parents think and believe for their daughters is different from what they want for their son.”because he realized the situation my brother was in because he is also from the same background.  So, he was much calmer and he apologized to the girlfriend’s parents.

Then they came again. They said they wanted my brother’s phone to read all the messages, all the pictures of their daughter. My brother said “I won’t give them my phone.” They threatened to go the police. Realizing the situation, my father said that we needed to give them the phone so they can just check it out and they will give it back to my brother. They checked the phone and deleted all the pictures and then deleted all the messages.

On that day, I realized what parents think and believe for their daughters is different from what they want for their son. My dad was outside our home talking to the girl’s dad and I went to my brother’s room and said “You know what. It doesn’t matter that this happened to you but I can realize what the girl’s going through.” Her parents emotionally blackmailed her to cut all ties with my brother. I realized it must have been a horrible situation for her.

I talked to my brother and said “I’m really angry because I know what she’s going through. If I would have been in that situation, the scenario in our home would have been different.” My mother was now calmer, my father was calmer, but if it had been me caught in a relationship, oh my God.

The Culture Clash

EM:  Are you of the Muslim faith?

FS:  Yes.

Men_in_Pakistan_Market PlaceEM:  Do you have a sense that other young women like yourself of the Muslim faith in places like Pakistan are in similar situations? That when they come from those countries to the United States where the cultural mores are different, where young men and young women behave differently?

In the west there are women in their mid-twenties and even thirties who are still single but they have careers. Do you feel like you’re running into a cultural clash because you’re coming from a culture that has very different values when it comes to how a young woman should behave and how much education a young woman should get?

FS: I think yes.  I 100% agree with that. There is not only a culture clash in the United States, but also in Pakistan. The area where I come from, people are not that well educated. They are very narrow-minded. That narrow-mindedness is what my parents took with them when they came here. The people who are from a different area in the same country who have a different mindset, they also have a clash with “. . . 45% of the people want to stand up for women and 55% or 60% of people want to control them.”people who are very extremist regarding their beliefs. Not only about religion, but also about how they want the woman to live like. You can say that 45% of the people want to stand up for women and 55% or 60% of people want to control them.

It’s not only when you come from Pakistan or India to here. It’s also other countries. It’s about the mindset, where they have lived and how their mindset is shaped. That belief then comes in the form of decisions and how they behave with other people. There’s a lot going on. Not only here, but there too.

I have friends there and some of them are married. Half of them quit their education and half of them are continuing their education. Some are continuing their education without getting married. Some of them are getting married by their own will to the person they like and they are completing their education. They are not from the same area.  Some of them are from Lahore, Karachi, some from Islamabad.  Some of them are from the part where I came from.  Each one of them have different lives. They face different situations in their lives and face different hardships.


In Part II of this blog (which will be posted next week), Female Student (FS) tells us how she relates to her parents and  plans to navigate the next chapter of her life after college.

NOTE: The images in this blog are from Creative Common License stock and do not reflect any of the individuals mentioned in the blog.

Eugene Marlow, MBA, Ph.D., © 2022

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Update: The Max Borak Story

Marlowsphere (Blog #153)

This is a follow up to my 2016 blog “Kids + Jazz Alive & Well” about the “Jazz for Kids” program at Jazz Standard.

Max Borak, age 11On October 16, 2016 (a Sunday) I visited the “Jazz for Kids” program at Jazz Standard just off 27th Street and Lexington Avenue (Jazz Standard closed in December 2020 after offering a combination of barbecue and jazz since 2002). I arrived at around 11:30 a.m. It was an amazing sight in this leading basement jazz venue.

The star of the afternoon, for me, at least, was Max Borak, an 11-year-old vocalist who performed Jerome Kern’s Oscar-winning song “The Way You Look Tonight.” Not exactly the kind of tune you would expect an 11-year-old to choose to sing, but then Max Borak is not your usual kid.

I spoke with him briefly after he concluded his rehearsal. Turns out his singing model is Frank Sinatra. Apparently, when he was younger he saw the movie “The Parent Trap” and fell in love with Sinatra’s rendition of the song of the same title. Try to imagine Wayne Newton’s voice in the body of an 11-year-old who is not yet five feet tall. This “kid” displayed poise and audience connection way beyond the norm. His use of the microphone also showed a professional understanding of stage mechanics. I thought to myself, “You’ll hear from him one day.”

Fast forward to December 2021. Keith, Max’s father, reached out to me and asked if I would be interested in doing a follow-up blog about Max. I readily agreed.

Max Borak, age 16Max Borak is now a junior and a music major at Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music and Art and Performing Arts, one of the specialized high schools in New York City. You have to audition to get in. Following is our conversation:

EM: How did you feel performing at the Jazz Standard at the tender age of 11 years old?

Max: I felt so gifted to be even close to performing on that stage with all my friends and everybody there cheering me on. It was a dream come true and it was worth every moment of it.

EM: When did you realize you could sing and might sing professionally?

Max: I had always been humming tunes in the back of the car. One day I decided to just open my mouth and see how far I could go.  My dad said, “Wait a minute, I hear something.  I hear talent.”  From that moment on I just knew music was part of my life for good.  I was probably maybe five or six.

EM: Why do you sing jazz standards?

Max: I was drawn to jazz standards mostly because of what I feel listening to jazz music. All the swing and all the pop and funk doesn’t get to me as much as jazz. It makes you feel a certain way that you’re somewhere that you can be.  You’re on top of the world. You see it all and you have it all. You’re listening to an Ella Fitzgerald record and you just think, my goodness, it’s such a beautiful, beautiful feeling that I’m having.

I listen to some of the Rat Pack, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr. A lot of old classics like that.  I’ve been listening to “King Pleasure,” “Moody’s Mood for Love,” all those wonderful songs that I can just riff off of.

I like to consider myself genre-less.  I see all music as part of what I come from.  But I mostly consider jazz as the single part of my identity that I could never give up.

Max Borak performs with other studentsEM: How do you feel attending LaGuardia High School?

Max: It takes chops. There is some talent there like you would never believe. I am so blessed to have every day to spend with them, learning and perfecting my craft.  I made a promise to myself a while back, when I had the gift of seeing the LaGuardia Jazz Band perform, live, when the Jazz Standard was still open, that I would have the ability to learn more from those knowledgeable people—more than any other people in the City. I got in and got a seat in that school and I’m so glad I did.

There are not necessarily singers in that group, however, the orchestration can take your breath away. There have been plenty of other singers before me that front the jazz band. Currently, I’m the only singer.

EM: What’s in your repertoire?

Max: Songs like “I Thought About You,” “Autumn Leaves,” “Moody’s Mood for Love.” I’ve been thinking a lot about expanding my repertoire, too.  Not only in jazz, but I’ve also gotten into a lot of opera music and solo opera performance.

We’ve been rehearsing an oratorio, Handel’s Messiah. We’ve had the privilege of Juilliard representatives actually coming from across the street to give us feedback. I am humbled that they take the time to see us and to speak with us especially because it’s such a prestigious school.

As a junior at LaGuardia comes with a lot of pressure. Not necessarily bad pressure, but there’s a lot of expectation that comes with being a junior.  It’s my job to deliver on that and make everything worth it.

EM: Who are some of your teachers? And what kinds of courses are you taking?

Max: I study with Mr. Kevin Blancq, Mr. Darrel Jordan, and Mr. Piali.  I’m currently involved in mixed chorus, that is, our chorus is co-ed. That involves tenors, altos, sopranos along with bass tenors which is my range. I’m taking music theory and music history where I’m learning Max Borak performs with quartet at NYC restaurant during COVIDabout the greats and their mark on music history. With classical music, however, we do talk a lot about music invention, music instrumentation, and composition. It’s a very free-flowing discussion.

EM: What about after high school?

Max: I’ll be graduating in 2023. I’m looking for further education, hopefully at a conservatory. I’m very open to the possibility of traveling abroad.  Maybe signing with an opera company or maybe staying in New York and seeing where my talent really fits.  We’re in the land of possibilities, so let that happen.

EM: Where have you performed so far?

Max: I’ve had the pleasure of performing in front of an audience at Lincoln Center and Sardi’s.  I’ve done countless street and restaurant shows in the Upper West Side of Manhattan and the Lower East Side. I’ve performed in the La Guardia School itself–in our little theater that we have in the back.  Other opportunities that I was involved in include the tree lighting in Rockefeller Center. I was involved in a lot of the Italian cultural events in the Bronx. For instance, I was invited to sing at the San Genaro Feast, the big street fair. I was very fortunate to be invited and sing some Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin songs. Everybody loved it.

EM: Who else in your family has the musical genes?

Max: Surprisingly, nobody else in my family has musical talent. My dad will say he can play lead triangle if he really tried. I like to think most of my musical influence came from my dad’s spectrum of music knowledge. He really guided me towards a lot of what his father was listening to when he was a young boy. It made me so happy to see him smile.”

Keith & Max BorakMax’s father, Keith, interjects: “My wife and I didn’t know if we were going to be able to have children. But out popped this beautiful boy with dark hair and light eyes just like my dad. He started humming the songs my dad loved for years when he was about five or six years old.  Then he started to sing them. Unfortunately, Max never met my dad. I’ve always felt like he’s been with Max the whole time. He’s named after his grandfather, of course.”

EM: Who are some of your influences?

Max:  Of course, I’ve listened to the New School jazz repertoire for a while now. Often when I think about what comes next in my musical career, I’ll look back at those before me who put in the dedication and devotion and were stepping up to the plate. There wasn’t the path written before them, so they had to carve the path to get there.

EM: Have you recorded an album or a single track?

Max: I have never recorded an album but would sure love to.  I’ve never quite asked the question of what songs I would pick for my album if I were to do one. Just off the top of my head, I could think of me singing “That’s Life.” Life has ups and downs. I’ve definitely felt that during COVID.  I bet everybody has.

EM: What’s been the biggest challenge for you during the pandemic?

Max: The biggest challenge I’ve experienced dealing with my music this year is I lost my grandmother to COVID. She was very dear to me and my father. It took a lot of strength to keep her in my heart even though I was unable to see her. I was too young to see her. To think of her and not feel sad and not feel doubt and not feel like how can I lose my rock?  She was very important to not only me, but also to my family. All my family. It really weighed us all down.  She had a long life with people who loved her and she cared every moment she had.  I saw the good in every moment she was with me.

EM: Do you have a philosophy of life going forward?

Max: There is no point in not trying.  If you give it your all and you put everything you have into it, then there is no reason you shouldn’t get there. You deserve success as much as anybody else. You give it your all and you are sure as hell not going to take it from anybody else.  If the opportunity is there, why not you?  Make it you.

Eugene Marlow, MBA, Ph.D., © 2022

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