B.B., Buddy, the Allman Bros, Pres. Obama and me

February 22, 2012

I was enthralled watching the live stream of last night’s White House celebration of the blues, the music which has been so central to my career and my life’s soundtrack. Mick Jagger was a big draw, of course, but he doesn’t mean that much to me, especially in light of the other artists there. Buddy [...]

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Jinshanling-Simatai Great Wall hike

February 21, 2012

I came across this video I made several years ago capturing the wild Wall hike I always loved to do. This time, I completed it with Jacob, then 10 or 11, my nephew Jesse, about 16, and a visiting friend Nico, 14. It was scorching hot and this is not an easy hike, but what [...]

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An inside look at Chinese hoops

February 17, 2012

Once again inspired by Jim Yardley’s wonderful new book Brave Dragons: A Chinese Basketball Team, an American Coach, and Two Cultures Clashing, I present my own experiences with Chinese basketball. I am in the process of interviewing Jim and in the next week, our conversations will be popping up in a couple of different places, covering [...]

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Thank you Canadians – check out this CBC broadcast

February 16, 2012

I suddenly started getting emails from Canadians; notices of new YouTube comments on “Beijing Blues” videos from Canadian readers; and CD purchase orders from Canadians. All of them said they had just heard a CBC broadcast about me, Woodie Alan and Big in China. You’ll have to scroll down the page to hear it once [...]

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Inside B.B. King’s breakthrough hit, “The Thrill Is Gone”

February 15, 2012

Years ago, Guitar World dedicated an entire issue to the 100 Greatest Solos Ever. As with all such lists, it was somewhat arbitrary but a lot of fun. I wrote a lot of the entries, and will be posting them here randomly, as I see fit,sometimes with added commentary. One editorial note: I did not [...]

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RIP Jeffrey Zaslow – updated with eulogies and links to his columns

February 11, 2012

I was devastated to hear yesterday about the death of Jeffrey Zaslow, the great Wall Street Journal columnist and reporter and the author of many best-selling non-fiction books – a remarkable four in the last two years. I never met Jeff, but we exchanged a lot of emails over the past couple of years. When [...]

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Big in China Video

February 10, 2012

John Prine’s “Great Rain”, Uncle Mike’s, NYC.January, 2012.

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Unrest and beauty in Sichuan, China’s Wild West

February 8, 2012

I have a real soft space in my heart for Western China. It’s a beautiful place filled with fascinating people – many of them Tibetan. Though outside the border of Tibet,  much of northern Yunnan and western Sichuan are on the Tibetan plateau and populated by many Tibetans. (Parts of other provinces are also on [...]

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Butch Trucks loves Big in China

February 6, 2012

I had a pleasant surprise a couple of months ago when I randomly received an email from the Allman Brothers manager saying that drummer Butch Trucks wanted to chat with me – he had read Big in China and was really fascinated by it. This led to several, continuing conversations with Butch and the quote below. [...]

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Are pink ribbons evil?

February 4, 2012

The headline above is intentionally confrontational and I don’t really  think pink ribbons are evil. I believe there has almost certainly been at least one very positive outcome from all of this, which is that women going through chemo or other treatments feel more comfortable not having to hide any of it. But I have always [...]

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