My wife and I drove to Ogden on Saturday to be part of the audience for a huge show at Weber State University’s Wildcat Stadium. I had written a song for the event, and had shepherded the song through a couple of big firesides and a recording session. The event itself was monstrous (and the song a very small part of it): 3,500 costumed youth on the field, performing for a packed stadium. And I’m of two minds about the experience. More...

I’m thinking of three things. Here’s the first one: I remember a conversation some years ago with Scott Bronson. Having danced around as sort of an art-hobbyist for years, I was contemplating what I described in conversation with Scott as a kind of mystical leap into greater loyalty to artful pursuits – a new covenant to follow the muse.  My tone was getting pretty lofty, and I was getting kind of worked up. Scott listened patiently, and then brought me back down to earth by saying something like, “Relax, Sam. It’s not like we’re talking about curing cancer.” The comment was made more potent, perhaps, by the fact that Scott was, at that time, battling cancer. Anyway, that’s the first thing. More...

When I was ten, I wanted to publish a book. I knew plenty of adults who had published books, and I fancied myself a writer beyond my years. I had even begun a book: a noir thriller about a cat-and-mouse struggle between a gumshoe named Roy Marlow and a villain named Bordeaux, whose henchmen used guns loaded with bullets inscribed with the symbol of their evil syndicate (though they mostly used crossbows). With loads of objectivity, I had compared the beginnings of my book with an early story, written at about my age, by an author whose later works I had on my bedroom shelf. That story was called “The Last Gunfire,” a western written in huge pencil letters on three or four pages of elementary-school-ruled newsprint. Compared with “The Last Gunfire,”  “Bordeaux” was killer. I was sure of it. I was ready to talk to publishers. More...

I’ve got a friend who plays in a band for a living, and because he and his mates travel with lots of expensive gear, he keeps as close an eye as he can on what’s happening on the tarmac as luggage gets loaded. Through airplane windows, he watches stuff get tossed around, smart-phone camera at the ready. He’s snapped some photos of some particular scary luggage moments, and he’s always one touch of the screen away from communicating such to an audience of his choosing.

Some twenty years ago or more, my dad, a traveling musician himself, lost a guitar to a baggage handling accident. Bob Dylan had been its former owner. More...

Spoke last week in a stake fireside in Las Vegas. David Skousen introduced me (he also accompanied the opening hymn for the fireside: a rendition of “The Spirit of God” that would have parted your hair. Also, as he stood at the pulpit I learned that he’d dated my stepmom). In his introduction, he spoke of the necessity of being a “useful artist,” which is kind of a loaded phrase. And while I wouldn’t presume to speak for David as to exactly what he’d call a “useful artist” (I’ve got my own ideas about artists and their usefulness), it did at least seem apparent that his comment had to do with the relationship between artist and audience – that it contained an assertion that in the process of making art, the audience has a seat at the table.

So I’m thinking over the last few days about audiences. And the one solid principle that I keep coming back to is this: audiences don’t owe artists anything. More...