This is a sequel to my original Path Crossings piece. I wrote that in 2001 as a typewritten photocopied handout and shared it in this blog in 2010. You can see the original at the end of this piece. Among other things, It focused a lot on my brief encounters with jazz musicians in Detroit and New York. It was quite comprehensive but there’s a lot that I left out. I’ve lived a full and complicated life.
I’ve spent time in several amazing periods of utopian days, living in magical spaces. It’s great to live in an autonomous zone. They never last but it’s sweet while you’re there. Some are more fugitive such as living in surrealism or living in art. Some friendships and relationships are like that: you’re there, but suddenly you’re not. You might find your way back to it or it might be lost forever.
These special spaces include my association with Jacques Karamanoukian and Galerie Jacques and with Detroit’s Zeitgeist Gallery and Performance Venue. I had many magical and intense visits to New York City. I went there nearly every year from 1980 to 2017. Thanks to my hosts Bill and Margie, Gail and my brother Matt. The Fourth Street Fair was usually amazing. From 1996 to 2006 or 2007, I helped with the planning, the clean-up and got to perform there. In 1996 and 1997 I did a huge unauthorized art project all over Detroit’s J.L Hudson’s building. I got to see them implode my art work, along with the rest of the building. These were some of the most important spaces where dream and imagination cast their spells on me.
The first of these was centered around the Catacombs Coffee house in Detroit’s Jefferson-Chalmers neighborhood. I was on the staff through parts of my high school and college days. I’ll write a more complete history of it, soon I hope. Those were amazing times. The coffee house would draw huge crowds from all over the Detroit area, not just from our neighborhood. The entertainment included music, poetry, comedy, old movies and more. Besides myself and my siblings, such Detroit musicians as R.J. Spangler, Rick Steiger and James O’Donnell played there fairly often. Their band Kuumba laid the seeds for such later projects as the Sun Messengers and the Planet D Nonet. Among the well-known people who performed there were musician Joe Henry and actor/comedian David Alan Grier.
Around that time, we used to go to comic book conventions in hotels downtown. I’d run into stars like Bette Midler and Lou Reed on the elevator or in the lobby.
I worked for Crowley’s department store in the New Center neighborhood. The Fisher Theatre and the Hotel St. Regis were nearby. Once Redd Foxx came into the store. He had a pocketful of autographs to pass out. I didn’t get one but I said hello, at a distance. I saw Wendy O. Williams in the Fisher Building drugstore. There were many others as well.
In the days after the Catacombs Coffee House, I became part of a lively Detroit arts scene. I started to show my artwork in galleries in 1980. Years before I started to live there, I was part of the Cass Corridor art scene. I got to know a lot of poets, musicians and visual artists. The Cobb’s Corner Bar, Alvin’s, the Willis Gallery. the Michigan Gallery, the Detroit Focus Gallery, the Detroit Artist’s Market, the Detroit Institute of Arts, the Scarab Club and the Freezer Theatre were some of the major spots to visit and maybe even work with.
Dudley Randall was a librarian at the University of Detroit while I was there, from 1971 to 1976. I remember him and we spoke a few times. The Broadside Press work was important and I enjoyed reading it. Other poets that I knew included Ron Allen, Mick Vranich and Jesse Nowells. I was always sort of an outsider as regards the poetry scene. I started to photocopy my work and pass it out for free, partly to find a way in.
One poet who seemed to be both inside and outside was the late Jim Gustafson. I liked his work and we were friendly. Once I saw him walking down Cass on a Sunday morning, dressed in his bathrobe and reading a newspaper. Was he also walking a dog? I think so.
Detroit’s art scene was vibrant and I met a lot of wonderful artists and got to see their work. I saw former Detroiter Ray Johnson perform at the Detroit Institute of Arts. I attended a lot of musical concerts, lectures, plays, poetry readings and movie screenings. I still try to do so, though the pandemic has made this difficult.
I frequently visited the Heidelberg project and got to know Tyree Guyton. I also remember his grandfather, the amazing artist Sam Mackey.
In New York, my brother Matt and I got to meet Tuli Kupferberg in Tompkins Square Park. At the Whitney Museum, I saw a performance by Naim June Paik and Charlotte Moorman and said hello. Once I was on an elevator where people were telling stories about the photographer Lee Miller. It sounded like they actually knew her. I got to watch the street artist Curtis Cuffie create some of his work and talk a bit. I remember him playing Johnny Cash on his boom box. I got to hang out with Bill Carney and his musical groups the Jug Addicts and Les Sans Culottes. Numerous times, in NYC, I’d run into people from Detroit, by chance. For a time there, I’d keep seeing Marcus Belgrave. When he saw me in Detroit he’d ask me if I’d been to New York lately. I think it was in 2016 that I met Frank Wess after he played a jazz mobile show in Harlem. He signed a CD for me and we talked a bit.
I never got to visit Howard Armstrong’s home or to get any of his artwork, but we had some good talks. I loved his music and his drawing, painting and sculpture. I’d run into him walking around or on the bus. Once we agreed that my green pepper had a remarkably close resemblance to Richard Nixon. Another time, he was heading into a fast food joint for lunch and said “Excuse me while I partake of this greasy spoon.”
Others come to mind: Jack Johnson, Jim Puntigam, James Dozier, Leni Sinclair, Ibn Pori Pitts, Frank Pahl, Stephen Goodfellow, Jim Pallas, Erik Mesko, Mary Fortuna, Lowell Boileau, Bob Sestok, Diana Alva, Sean Bieri, Bill Bryan, Vito Valdez, Joan Painter Jones, Bob Marsh, Bryant Tillman, and Robert Hyde, I could keep adding to these lists and I probably will.
Rest In Peace old friends: Jacques Karamanoukian, Gregory Peters, Paul Schwarz, John Piet, Mick Vranich, Harold Schnurr, Robin Summers, Faruq Z. Bey, Gordon Newton, Barbara Greene-Mann, Sherry Hendrick, Michael Luchs, Charles McGee and Gary Grimshaw.
Part One of this post, from 2001:
The link right above gets one to my 2014 piece Detroit’s Visual Arts Scene, Names Named.
These photos will enlarge if you click on them and hit the backspace to return to the post.
Adventures and Resources 
