Teruah on TV (with a face for podcasts)

That's right, I was on local access television recently. And someone actually watch the show. In fact, I only know I was on because a friend happened to stumble across the show, recognize me, and watch it, and then sent me an email about it. Yep. The joys of local access TV.

You may remember that I gave a talk at the wonderful Ann Arbor District Library a few months back. The video of the talk is finally up on the AADL website. Check it out! I only sounded like an idiot two or three times. For me that's not too bad. It turns out the library tossed the video over to the local access TV station. And yes..clearly I have a face for podcasts.

Here's a link to the library video page. You can watch the video or download it as an audio file. So far it's been viewed 63 times. Pretty cool.

Here's the description of the Ann Arbor library talk...

"Ignite Second Stage: The Silver Age of American Jewish Music is Happening Now! And You're Missing It!

Jewish music is exploding. Bands and labels and venues are multiplying. Rock. Hip Hop. Reggae. Punk. Klezmer. Sephardic. Choral. Jazz. Chassidic-Pop. Bible-gum. Beat Box. House. Socialist Yiddish Gothic. Indie. A revolution is happening but we're scattered across a big nation with no common media to connect us....except the net. Will it be enough? Jack Zaientz, an Ann Arbor area research scientist who blogs about contemporary Jewish Music, will introduce you to some of the most amazing new Jewish music that you've never heard.

This Extended Play version of Jack's recent 5 minute Ignite Ann Arbor talk will be loaded with more music, a road-map of the contemporary Jewish Music scene, a case study in social-networking Jewish Music, and the greatest Jewish song you've never heard."

My next speaking gig is going to be October 25th at Temple Beth Emeth in Ann Arbor. I'll be part of an adult education evening. You don't have to be a member to attend. All are welcome. Here's the topic:

The Music of the Diaspora
Description: In this meeting we'll talk about and listen to examples of secular and religious music from around the Jewish world including Ashkenazi, Sepharidic, Morrano/Converso, Ethiopian, Israeli, Mountain Jews, and Mizrachi Jews.
Discussion questions: How much of our view of being of Jewish comes from our immediate surroundings and culture? Now that the internet has made unexpected corners the world immediately available, how might that change our sense of Jewish culture? How will that change our sense of being Jewish?

I'm hoping this will be the beginning of a series of Jewish music talks at TBE. I'd also like to ones on the music of prayer, music in the home, and current popular music (Radical Jewish Culture and Shiny Shoe Music). We'll see how the first one goes.