Henry Miller Memorial Library

There have been many songs written in, say, the last 100 years.  Hundreds, even!

So here’s a fun fact: the second greatest song* of them all, Surf’s Up, was co-written by Van Dyke Parks, who, amazingly is performing a benefit for the Henry Miller Library along with Philip Glass (!!) on Sunday, May 19th at the Music Hall of Williamsburg.

Tickets HERE.  Analysis below.

Now I could get English major-y and try to interpret Van Dyke’s lyrics as I see them.  But then I came across the following commentary from Brian himself.  His is better:

It’s a man at a concert. All around him there’s the audience, playing their roles, dressed up in fancy clothes, looking through opera glasses, but so far away from the drama … Empires, ideas, lives, institutions—everything has to fall, tumbling like dominoes. He begins to awaken to the music; sees the pretentiousness of everything … A choke of grief.

At his own sorrow and the emptiness of his life, because he can’t even cry for the suffering in the world, for his own suffering. And then, hope. Surf’s up! … I heard the word—of God; Wonderful thing—the joy of enlightenment, of seeing God. And what is it? A children’s song!

And then there’s the song itself; the song of children; the song of the universe rising and falling in wave after wave, the song of God, hiding His love from us, but always letting us find Him again, like a mother singing to her children.

Of course that’s a very intellectual explanation. But maybe sometimes you have to do an intellectual thing. If they don’t get the words, they’ll get the music, because that’s where it’s really at, in the music.

* #1, of course, is “God Only Knows.”

As you may have heard, the Henry Miller Library is heading to Brooklyn from May 12-19 for the Big Sur Brooklyn Bridge, a week’s worth of music, cinema, poetry, and then some.  (Full schedule here.)

Highlights include a once-in-a-lifetime concert at the Music Hall of Williamsburg with Philip Glass and Van Dyke Parks (tickets here), comedy night with Upright Citizens Brigade (tickets here), and a week-long pop-up bookstore at the City Reliquary.

Recently the brainchild behind the operation, HML Executive Director Magnus Torén sat down (in front of his computer) with Maria Garcia Teutsch, HML Chairwoman, editor of the Ping Pong lit mag, and curator of the Bridge’s opening night party and poetry night (tickets here.)

Here is their e-chat!

MGT: Tell me about how you got started thinking about the Big Sur Brooklyn Bridge project?

Magnus Torén: I have had this in the back of my mind for a long time–it isn’t exactly a great big novel idea! Miller grew up in Willamsburg and it seems we should go there to show off what we do on behalf of the homeboy who did good!

Specifically what clinched it this time was when I spoke with my friend Peter (Hale) about coming over to do this and he mentioned the City Reliquary, a place we had visited together some years back, being right around the corner from 662 Driggs Ave, (where Miller grew up) I thought ‘OK, this is it–it is meant to be!’

MGT: What will your participation be in this event, you know, besides running the show?

MT: I look forward to meeting people, getting a chance to share in ideas about what it means to celebrate art and writers, what it means to support freedom of expression, and perhaps find out if we can get a place to have a Miller Library on a permanent basis in Brooklyn.(!) You know it’ll be a busy time, I’ll have a bunch of little things to tend to . . .

MGT: What are you most excited about seeing in this event?

MT: The streets of Brooklyn in May!

MGT: What role do you think artists have in the 21st century?

MT: Since our ability to communicate is undergoing a paradigm shift, artists play an increasingly important role; the facility with which good and bad ideas can spread to the peoples of the world is astounding; therefore, it is ever more important to populate those airwaves and microwaves with humanism and the arts!

MGT: How does the Henry Miller Memorial library support artists?

MT: We propose the idea that art matters to all that come by. We have a place where we attempt to celebrate just being in the moment, no frills, some tea, coffee, books and green grass!

MGT: Why does this matter?

MT:  The ‘art’ is the vessel we use to share our common humanity, a way for all to communicate across borders, time and space. Seriously, I think art is so very, very, important and sometimes when you talk about it out loud it sounds like hyperbole.  But, I don’t think you can overstate the importance of supporting artists, it is in part through art that we arrive at an understanding of one another and our place in the world.

MGT: How will the Big Sur Brooklyn Bridge extend this role?

MT: It seems a natural extension of what we’ve done for the last 20 years – Paris is next! Aller Retour Big Sur!

“Once Upon A Time”.

The preshow features food for sale as well as cash bar, vendor booths, door prizes, live music, performers and a kids fashion show on the main stage at 7pm.

The fashion show will be another ridiculous and wonderful spectacle of fashion by local designers, all made with non-fabric materials and shared in performances by local models, emcee’d by Henry Miller Library director Magnus Toren.

Fernwood Resort hosts the official after-party.

Carpooling strongly encouraged.

Dress to impress!

Now it’s the Big Sur Brooklyn Bridge in Paper Mag here!

Upon his 1980 death, novelist Henry Miller’s (Tropic of Cancer) ashes were scattered in Big Sur, California. The following year, Miller’s friend Emil White chose the mountain city, midway up the California coast, as the location for The Henry Miller Memorial Library which continues to host writing workshops and performances by the likes of Patti Smith and Neil Young……

Full the full schedule of events, go here.  For tickets to the epic gala Philip Glass/Van Dyke Parks show, go here!

So now there’s news that Jessica Williams of the DAILY SHOW will be doing monologues for a portion of the Upright Citizens Brigade’s “Tropic of Laughter” event for the Big Sur Brooklyn Bridge!!

Yup, the UCB is putting together a night of comedy just for us. And Jessica will be there!

Tickets and info HERE: http://www.ticketweb.com/t3/sale/SaleEventDetail?dispatch=loadSelectionData&eventId=3515764&pl=kfny

Hey townies — TONIGHT The Henry Miller Memorial Library’s Executive Director Magnus Toren (HMMLEDMT) will be heading north to participate in Carmel’s Local History Lecture Series.

He will be presenting on, of course, Henry Miller: writer, artist, and iconic resident of Big Sur. He’ll talk about how Miller got here, what he did here, and how Big Sur influenced his writing and life.

Tuesday, April 30th, at 7 pm. It’ll be at the Community Room at All Saint’s Episcopal Parish, Lincoln St. at 9th Ave. in Carmel.

Admission is free and open to the public!

FB event here: https://www.facebook.com/events/132001470320868/

Tickets here!  http://www.musichallofwilliamsburg.com/event/264351-philip-glass-van-dyke-parks-brooklyn

What will be the “sleeper” event of the Big Sur Brooklyn Bridge?  Good question.

My vote is Tues. night.  In addition to Philip DeGruy, who, IMO, is one of the 10 most interesting people I’ve ever met, we just got word that Brooklyn’s own Cowbird will represent and provide some really cool local storytellers.

This much is true: the word is out.  The New York Daily News (here), Brooklyn Vegan (here), and Paper (here) are all aboard.  And we anticipate the excitement to only build!

And of course, there’s the anchor event with Philip Glass and Van Dyke Parks.  While I have you, it’s worth nothing that Van Dyke’s “Song Cycle” is one of the 20 best records of the 60s.

It’s like Stephen Foster on LSD!   Tremendously experimental and weird.

Here’s one cool lyric:

i was there upon a four-poster there
Mind tousled, i came to bear
Some thoughts on the past
Amid a dash of influenza

That’s so cool!

Just published on the New York Times online (link here):

“The Henry Miller Memorial Library, a nonprofit bookstore and arts center in Big Sur, Calif., where the novelist lived between 1940 and 1962, is sending envoys east to assert Miller’s presence – in spirit, anyway (he died in 1980) – in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, where he spent nearly a decade. The library’s Big Sur Brooklyn Bridge Festival, which opens on May 12 and runs for a week, will include an exhibition, readings, panel discussions, comedy and musical performances.

A likely highlight – a festival closing concert by Philip Glass and Van Dyke Parks and Friends at the Music Hall of Williamsburg on May 19 – may be only tenuously related to Miller and his work. But most of the events celebrate Miller’s blend of enterprising artistry and social engagement in one way or another.

The heart of the festival is a pop-up bookstore at the City Reliquary, a vest-pocket museum where some of Miller’s manuscripts, letters, watercolors and first editions will be on display (and where his books, as well as posters and relevant films, will be on sale) for the full run of the series.

At the Big Sur Brooklyn Bridge Staff Party, which is open to the public, on May 14 at the City Reliquary, Phillip de Gruy, a singer-songwriter, will perform, and Tim Youd, a visual artist who has based several works on Miller’s writings, will show a new piece based on “Tropic of Cancer.” On May 15, Peter Stampfel, Zach Brock, Al Rose and the Bushwick Gospel Singers will offer a concert of music inspired by Miller at  Spike Hill.

The program also includes a panel discussion, “Henry Miller: Libertine, Communard,” on May 16 at Spoonbill & Sugartown Booksellers; an evening of short films form the Big Sur International Short Film Screening Series and the Brooklyn Short Film Festival, at  Videology, on May 17; and “Tropic of Laughter,” an improvisatory performance by the  Upright Citizens Brigade Theater at the Knitting Factory on May 18.

So we just looked at the calendar and noticed the date.  April 20th!

Then it occurred to us: it’s a very cool and important date!  Can anyone guess what it is?

That’s right: 4/20 is the deadline to submit your films to the Big Sur International Short Film Screening Series.

With an esteemed jury that features Philip Glass, Kirsten Dunst, Laurie Anderson and more, the Series screens the world’s best short films every Thursday in June, July, and Aug.  It kicks off June 6th!  Click the link below to submit!

Click here: http://bigsurfilm.org/submit-your-film