Obama reads Pollan!

Obama reads Pollan!

This is so exciting:
Voilà the article, that was forwarded to me via my son Joseph Mastantuono, where Obama says that he read the Michael Pollan article I referred two blogs posts ago. No election had me so excited since the 1981 French presidential election.
But Before we all go out to vote on Tuesday please consider checking out this performance where I will one the featured artists at the Bowery Poetry Club this Saturday in New York:

MANHATTAN, NEW-YORK
Saturday November 1 2008
4 MOVTEXT

An international
and
Atypical Meeting
of
Practical Performances
by
4 Practitioners

(in order of apperance:)
Nicole Peyrafitte
Pierre Joris
Michel Collet
Valentine Verhaeghe

6PM $10
The Bowery Poetry Club
308 Bowery Street
New York, NY
(Between Houston and Bleecker)
F train to 2nd Ave, 6 to Bleecker
212-614-0505

Hope to see you there!

Back from Albany (Capital City of New York State!)

Back from Albany (Capital City of New York State!)

Mike Bisio and I whipped cream at Justin’s on Thursday night. We had a big, wonderful and most of all very attentive crowd. The best audience I ever had at Justin’s so far. We mostly performed originals, contemporary poems with only a dash of French songs and jazz standards. Mike played two incredibly moving solos, one was John Coltrane’s Alabama & the second was a piece he created on September 11th, 2001 – as he was in the studio that day. By the way Mike Bisio will be playing next Saturday, 9/20 at The Clean Feed Fest at the Living Theatre with Basso Continuo : Stephen Gauci, Nate Wooley, Ken Filiano and Mike Bisio. Starts at 9pm. I will be there!

I also wanted to note that on Wednesday my younger son Miles Joris-Peyrafitte had his first solo public appearance as a singer/songwriter at the famous Tess’ Lark Tavern open mike hosted by the rock goddess of Upstate New York: Mother Judge. Miles did very well: he also accompanied me on guitar on my song the Brooklyn Bridge & on a poem by his father, Pierre Joris. After that he played drums for his long time friend, the very talented Lindsey Rogowski.

One of the poems Mike Bisio and I performed on Thursday was by Mustafa Benfodil. I met Mustafa at the Festival “Voix de la Méditéranée” in Lodève and really liked his work. With his permission I would like to post the poem I translated and performed with Mike Bisio on Thursday. Voilà for now, enjoy this short, but intense poem and THANK YOU so much if you were in the audience on Thursday & always THANK YOU to the wonderful crew at Justin’s for their graciousness –and I know this week was very hard for them as their were dealing with the sudden loss of one of their very dear co-worker. Merci à tous!

Lune de miel à Baghdad
Nous nous sommes connus à Gaza
Nous nous sommes aimés à Ramallah
Nous nous sommes embrassés à Beyrouth
Nous nous sommes mariés à Alger
Nous nous sommes envolés à Baghdad
Nous sommes morts sous les bombes
Et nos coeurs ont fondé une ONG
Pour la protection des amours à haut risque
Et la continuation de la passion sous les tombes!

Honey moon in Baghdad
We met in Gaza
We loved in Ramallah
We kissed in Beirut
We wed in Algiers
We flew to Baghdad
We died under the bombs
& our hearts founded a NGO
for the protection of high risk love
& the continuation of passion under the tombs!

Poem by Mustafa Benfodil translated by Nicole Peyrafitte

Events 09/11 & 09/14

Events 09/11 & 09/14

Getting ready to go to Albany to see my family but also looking forward to gig with Mike Bisio the grand bassist & composer extraodinaire on Thursday Sept 11 @ Justin’s 9PM.

We will perform mostly originals, contemporary poetry and maybe our signature song or is it a dish? Pierre Joris posted two videos of Mike and I on his blog. Speaking of Pierre, he and I will be part of a celebration I am very much looking forward to:

At the Bowery Poetry Club, Sunday, September 14, 4:00 to 6:00PM

Jerome Rothenberg will be hosting a celebration of the 40th anniversary of Technicians of the Sacred, which brought a global range of oral & tribal poetry into focus & launched ethnopoetics as a new approach to poetry & performance. Joining him will be a group of active poets & performers including Charles Bernstein, Bob Holman, Pierre Joris, Charlie Morrow, Nicole Peyrafitte, Diane Rothenberg, Carolee Schneemann, & Cecilia Vicuña. (Bowery Poetry Club, 308 Bowery, between Houston & Bleecker, in NYC.)
Technicians of the Sacred: A Range of Poetries from Africa, America, Asia, Europe and Oceania, Second edition, Revised and Expanded


and for the new French edition, http://www.jose-corti.fr/titresmerveilleux/techniciensSacre.htm

More about the summer

More about the summer

ready for the reading!

I promise this my last post about the “Voix de la Mediterranée” in Lodève (well maybe, because it bring so much joy to reminisce about it!). During 10 days, about 80 poets and performers, take over the entire town. Poets perform everyday and sometime twice a day. The readings are outdoor, they start at 10 AM and end at about 2 AM every day!
There are readings along the river with the audience on buoys, or with their feet in the water, on a hammocks, or in chaises longues at candle night very late, and sometimes even on a real chairs!
There are action poets, political poets, lyrical poets, great poets, boring poets, storytellers, translators, musicians and a big book fair. Poets & performers come from all around the Mediterranean countries. There were Occitanans, Catalans, Basques, Moroccans, Algerians, Tunisians, Greeks, Italians, Macedonians, Turks, Iranians, Egyptians, Saudi Arabians, Croatians, Israelis, Slovenians, Bosnians Herzegovinians, Syrians and even a bunch of French poets! Unfortunately the Palestinian poets were missing, they were not given visas, it is not clear to me how and why but it is deplorable.

Bon, that is is for now your turn to enjoy!
https://www.nicolepeyrafitte.com/imagesblog/lodeve/LODEVE.html

Back in Brooklyn & processing French voyage

Back in Brooklyn & processing French voyage

Back in Brooklyn and processing summer material.
I plan to post more videos and pictures from the summer. Today, a clip of the closing performance at the “Voix de la Méditerranée” festival in Lodève. The clip is provided by Pierre Joris who recorded it with his tiny camera from the first row Sunday July 27th, thank you Pierre!
That evening I got to improvise several pieces by other poets and performers with wonderful musicians.
On percussion: Shadi. who is a marvelous Iranian musicians living in Marseilles right now . She plays many traditional instruments, do check out her myspace to find out more about her.

On guitar: Benoist Bouvot. Benoist’s work ranges from free jazz to theater & performance. When we started playing it was like we had always known each other: instant recognition of vocabulary AND his girlfriend turned out to be a close family acquaintance from Luchon (town where I was born and center of the world -if your didn’t know yet-). Click on the link to check out some of Benoist’s work.
The poem we are performing is by NaTYot from her book published by l’Harmattan: Erotik Mental Food. a collection of truly wonderful erotic poems.
Voilà for now and enjoy the clip!

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