briangruber

Billy Cobham

“Six Days at Ronnie Scott’s” Continues To Get All 5-Star Ratings on Amazon

May 10, 2019 by briangruber No Comments

Here are a few of the Top Reviews on Amazon. Don’t forget to leave one of your own.

Mike P.

This is deeply personal to Billy Cobham and this author gets that across to the reader!

Brian Gruber did an amazing job! In lieu of a standard BIOGRAPHY or AutoBIO, his unique format for this book has interviews with current band mates & composers. Also past band mates. Billy Cobham speaks very DIRECT & honest. I wish the book was 600 pages.

Great read and insight inside a WORLD CLASS musician. The Author has probed deep. Also the current 6 Night big band shows during the interviews keeps the reader from living in the past.

Brian G leaves the reader to consider (or perhaps – re-consider!) the powerful body of work by BC since his days with MO. I love that, as a reader and avid BC fan, that I was not forced to dwell on the MO period . And yet the author elicited very brutally honest comments about John McLaughlin and that period. Billy Cobham’s early period with Billy Taylor et al is fascinating.

Again, great insight to the personal feelings of a WORLD CLASS MUSICIAN.

Thanks to author Brian Gruber.

D Shah

Portrait of a Jazz Giant

Great stories are only great when told by great story tellers and Gruber is top draw, because, this is a great story! The author manages to capture the very essence of the brilliant Mr. Cobham, a musician who has been thrilling us with his musical artistry, for the past 50 years and who mischievously continues to confuse and evade the jazz police’s facile labels. An underrated composer with a prodigious body of work, Billy Cobham is deadly serious about the art of playing drums and is a man who doesn’t suffer fools easily.There are occasional displays of mild irritation at Gruber’s line of questioning, but Gruber, no acolyte, persists and is rewarded with Cobham’s no holds barred responses. I’m guessing this is because there is trust between author and subject. Vignettes like declining Stan Getz’ widow’s request to play Israel or his take on Keith Emerson of ELP and of course, stories of Miles and of him declining Miles’ offer to join the band and then there is the Jan Hammer interview, just some of the gems you will find in this book.

Revelations of his troubled relationship with John McLaughlin are simply riveting and this chapter alone is worth the price of the book. Occasionally funny, but mostly a raw and painful account of their relationship when both were members of the highly successful Mahavishnu Orchestra in the 1970s.

From his early years as the son of immigrant parents from Panama to his painful relationship growing up with his musician father, to his difficult and ultimately strained relationship with John McLaughlin, Cobham holds nothing back. Refreshingly, when asked awkward questions, Cobham, seems to have no filter, but a reckless respect for the truth.

If you really want to know what makes Billy Cobham tick, then buy this book. It is a moving and intimate account of a complex, sensitive and passionate musical giant. To quote Frank Black: “There are secrets being told here. If you listen closely you can spot them”.

Joshua

Great read

Six Days At Ronnie Scotts is such a terrific read. Billy Cobham has been one of my all time heroes- one of the most important drummers in the history of drumming. Billy also goes many steps father than most drummers because of his incredible musical compositions. To be able to read about Billy Cobham’s life from his childhood up to now is very fascinating. So many great stories like when Billy played for Mohammed Ali. Wow. This book gives so much insight about Billy’s life and also insight into how Billy thinks about so many important topics of life, music and drumming. Many thanks to Brian Gruber ( author ) for writing an awesome book about Billy Cobham’s life.

Blackpot

Loved the book’s insight into the creative process

Six Days at Ronnie Scott’s is like having a backstage pass to witness how Billy and his band members express themselves on stage and off stage. Billy’s mental astuteness is amazing and aspirational…. and the other band members are all uniquely inspirational.Because the author interacts so fluidly and comfortably with the entire band (it is as if Studs Terkel interviewed Jazz musicians) you witness the creative process close up. I also unexpectedly gained a much greater appreciation for the uniqueness of each Jazz performance.

Reading time: 3 min

Coaching•Koh Phangan

Writing Coaching Sessions and “Writers of Koh Phangan” Tuesday Meetings Resume

by briangruber No Comments

Koh Phangan is a long way to come for a writers group meetup but if you are on the island, come by some time. Each Tuesday night at 7:30pm, aspiring island writers meet to connect, create, share their work, and learn. We write from prompts at Orion’s gorgeous waterfront Beach Shala.

Join the island’s writers group, Writers of Koh Phangan, for news of regular free events, and network with 300 fellow storytellers.. Whether you are on or off the island, free introductory coaching sessions on your project or writing process are available, as well as longer term writing coaching programs. Have a writing project you need help completing? Email me at briankgruber@gmail.com.

Also… our next book club event is 15 May 6pm for a discussion of Anais Nin’s erotic classic “Henry and June.” Read the book or watch the movie or just come with a passion for Nin or Henry Miller.

Reading time: 1 min

Books•Surmountable

The Travel Phase of the Surmountable Book Project Is Now Complete

by briangruber No Comments

The ‘discovery’ phase of Surmountable, a two month jaunt through scenes of historic protests plus interviews with activists, academics, journalists, people on the street, thinkers, trouble makers, and witnesses is done. I arrived in Bangkok 2am from South Korea, after the final international leg of the trip that took me to Berlin, Kiev, Paris, Tunis, and Seoul.

The final itinerary traveled, four continents, 20 destinations, two months.

Now for the writing.

We have a wealth of raw material. Public thinkers like AEI’s Norm Ornstein, C-SPAN’s Brian Lamb, Adbusters/ Occupy Wall Street’s Kalle Lasn, Columbia University’s Todd Gitlin, historian Stephen Schlesinger. Journalists and authors. Front line activists who put their bodies on the line like Standing Rock’s LaDonna Brave Bull Allard who gave her land and was a leading figure in the Dakota Access Pipeline protests, Kiev ‘squad’ veterans like Anna Kovalenko who led an all-woman group to physically resist attacks by secret police and militia, Tasnim of Tunis who shed the veil to take to the streets and launch the end of long-time dictator Ben Ali and the beginning of the Arab Spring.

It’s a privilege to gather these stories and be in the process of remarkable women and men, sometimes via choreographed interviews, sometimes via odd moments of serendipity as when I wandered into a Tunisian protest from the front door of my hotel into a weekly communist rally honoring the death of a martyred civil society activist.

Adam Edwards and I go into projects like this with certain foundational ideas and the outline of an editorial structure, but with open minds and a fierce desire to explore what is true, what is just, and how citizens might live the American founders’ vision of an active engaged public.

We intend to publish this year. I will be publishing photos and interview excerpts in the coming weeks. Here are a few memorable images from the trip.

LaDonna Brave Bull Allard after picking me up at the Bismarck, North Dakota airport and driving me 90 minutes to the Standing Rock reservation. I had asked how to get to her and where to stay, to which she responded, "Brian, you just don't get it, do you, we're in the middle of nowhere." So she came and got me and put me up next door to her at the Water Protectors House. After two hours of conversation, and a home cooked meal by activists living in the house, she came by at 11pm with her new great granddaughter. "Direct descendent of Sitting Bull." We toured the tribal council, the pipeline and protest sites, the local college and Sitting Bull museum, the tribal casino, and her ancestors' burial grounds. — LaDonna Brave Bull Allard after picking me up at the Bismarck, North Dakota airport and driving me 90 minutes to the Standing Rock reservation. I had asked how to get to her and where to stay, to which she responded, “Brian, you just don’t get it, do you, we’re in the middle of nowhere.” So she came and got me and put me up next door to her at the Water Protectors House. After two hours of conversation, and a home cooked meal by activists living in the house, she came by at 11pm with her new great granddaughter. “Direct descendent of Sitting Bull.” We toured the tribal council, the pipeline and protest sites, the local college and Sitting Bull museum, the tribal casino, and her ancestors’ burial grounds.

I told Pastor Leon Ross of the Weeping Willow Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama that I had beers with four white fellows at the base of the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma the night before, and they said things were fine with race relations relations back in the day. He scoffed, "Sure for them they were. We were sick and tired and of being sick and tired." He worked in the Montgomery Improvement Association along with Dr Martin Luther King, Jr., pivotal in the bus boycott started by Rosa Parks. — I told Pastor Leon Ross of the Weeping Willow Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama that I had beers with four white fellows at the base of the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma the night before, and they said things were fine with race relations relations back in the day. He scoffed, “Sure for them they were. We were sick and tired and of being sick and tired.” He worked in the Montgomery Improvement Association along with Dr Martin Luther King, Jr., pivotal in the bus boycott started by Rosa Parks.

The Alley of the Heavenly Hundred Heroes, in the square where Ukraine's Maidan Revolution took place. Over 100 protestors were killed as the protests grew in scope and intensity. I walked the scenes of the clashes and the moving, detailed exhibits on the streets honoring the dead and commemorating the events. — The Alley of the Heavenly Hundred Heroes, in the square where Ukraine’s Maidan Revolution took place. Over 100 protestors were killed as the protests grew in scope and intensity. I walked the scenes of the clashes and the moving, detailed exhibits on the streets honoring the dead and commemorating the events.

Tasnm and the Martyr. She walked me to the train like the mother of three she is, insisting on carrying my backpack, and warning me not to talk to strangers. We attended two protests that day, a second in front of the Central Bank as it was anti-imperialism day and students marched through the streets pushing past heavily armed police trying to stop them.

The palace at the far end of Gwanghwamun Square in central Seoul where Koreans gathered every Saturday, first in the hundreds, then thousands, then hundreds of thousands until the president was impeached, turned out of office, and imprisoned with a 26 year term.

Reading time: 3 min

Books•Surmountable

The Surmountable Tour Begins

March 11, 2019 by briangruber No Comments

As so it begins. I begin my interviews of practitioners of the art of protest from Selma to Seoul tomorrow for the Surmountable book project. Thanks to my co-writer Adam Edwards and to our 80+ Kickstarter funders for supporting my travel to 4 continents over the next two months. My first interview will be at the iconic City Lights bookstore in North Beach, San Francisco, Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s shop on the corner of Broadway and Columbus which shocked the literary world with its publication of Alan Ginsberg’s “Howl.” I will talk to the shop’s executive director and publisher Elaine Katzenberger then on to tech writers and the Electronic Frontier Foundation. What would you ask her??

Reading time: 1 min

Books•popular•Surmountable

“Surmountable” Kickstarter Campaign is Funded at $15,001 With 83 Backers

March 6, 2019 by briangruber No Comments

The “Surmountable” Kickstarter project is funded as of March 1 at $15,011 with over 80 backers. The trip to scenes of historic protests around the United States and around the world begins immediately. Thanks to all of our backers for supporting this adventurous and ambitious project. I will be blogging from each destination throughout March and April, starting in San Francisco. USA destinations will include Seattle/ Vancouver, Standing Rock Reservation in North Dakota, Selma and Montgomery, Alabama, Charleston, West Virginia, Washington, D.C., the Alice Paul Institute in Mount Laurel New Jersey and New York City.