An Allee Willis featurette The unexpected death of multi-talented songwriter Allee Willis Tuesday (Dec. 24) left the many who knew and loved her—and the countless others who were deeply affected by her music--stunned and saddened. “What a talent, what a character, what a loss,” tweeted fellow Songwriters Hall of Fame inductee Diane Warren. “Rest in musical power.” Recalled the Hall’s president/CEO Linda Moran, “Allee Willis was a true renaissance woman, talented in so many ar

Peter Asher, with help from Walker County, performs Linda Ronstadt's "Blue Bayou" at The Cutting Room Peter Asher has been performing his Peter Asher: A Musical Memoir of the 60s and Beyond for several years now, adding new autobiographical bits--recollections, photos, videos--each time around. Indeed, he’s got so much material that he’s filled a new book (The Beatles A to Zed, derived from his SiriusXM From Me to You radio show on the Beatles Channel) with it. The current Mu

The titletrack of "Winter Stories" As The New York Times noted last month, Judy Collins is 80—and still performing 120 shows a year. But the hook for the feature was the Nov. 29 release of her latest album Winter Stories, a collaboration with Norwegian folk singer-songwriter Jonas Fjeld--and with backing by American bluegrass group Chatham County Line, with whom Fjeld previously recorded three albums. It follows two other recent collaborative albums from Collins: the Grammy-n

BETTY at The Cutting Room, Dec. 8, 2019 With City Winery in transition to a new location, BETTY’s annual holiday show took place Dec. 8, under the Winery’s auspices, at the packed Cutting Room. More significantly, brilliantly wacky Amy Ziff (cello), who with sister Elizabeth Ziff (guitar) and Alyson Palmer (bass) have been the beloved musical/political trio since the mid-1980s, continued last year’s complete turnaround in holiday demeanor—from total negative to apparent posit