Jim Duffy

Rods and Cones is coming out of the woodwork, with a vengeance.

Go check out "Education in Love" here, freshly available!

The band, in its first iteration, performed and recorded from 1982 through 1988. One track, "Round Room," from 1983, appeared on the compilation "Boston Rock and Roll, Volume 3." Then came our self-titled, five-song EP in 1985, featuring the Boston-area hit "Education in Love." Finally, in 1988, came our swan song, the full-length album "New Breed." Some live material was also released…

OK, I'm biased, and I am also privileged to be friends with some people who are making fabulous music. Here are three new releases from friends - let me pull your coat in their direction.

Mary Brett Lorson, Themes From Whatever 

Mary Brett Lorson lives in the Ithaca, N.Y., area and has been a prolific and multi-talented artist for many years. She came to prominence in the 1990s as the singer and co-songwriter for the band Madder Rose, which made waves in both the U.S. and U.K. Since then, she has…

Since I last wrote, I have been hanging out in the late 16th and early 17th century. I have been finding my way back to the earliest roots of keyboard music, and I don't mean Jerry Lee Lewis.

Lately I've been playing pieces by the Renaissance-to-Baroque composer William Byrd (1540-1623), who may have been the first full-on keyboard virtuoso. In Byrd's day, the keyboard was a relatively new instrument, dating back only to the 1400s. Think about it - people had been playing lutes and harps for centuries…

Let me tell you about my brief career as an accordion player.

In 1995, I was in the band Martin's Folly, and we were making our first album with producer Eric "Roscoe" Ambel. Singer Chris Gray and I had written some tunes that were "rootsy" or that harkened back to old-time styles. In fact, one or two tunes sounded like sea chanties. "Accordion!" That's what I yelped. "We need an accordion!"

So I went in search of an accordion. At that time, hard to believe, there were two full-time accordion shops in…

Last Saturday night, Karl Berger - pianist, vibraphonist, teacher and leader of the Creative Music Studio - presented a night of new piano music with strings at the Greenwich House Music School on Barrow Street in Greenwich Village. He sounded great and gentle on that Steinway in that old, musty auditorium - great touch, great feeling.

On bass was Ken Filiano, bowing a lot and creating a real acoustic buzz on the instrument. On violin was Sana Nagano, who participated in the spring CMS workshop. At the…

Happening today are the women's marches in Washington, D.C., and around the United States and around the world. I send my best wishes to everyone who is participating in these events.

Yes, march against the president. And let's not lose sight of the likelihood that the most direct threat to us comes not necessarily from the president but from the Republicans in Congress. They have cleared the way to repeal the Affordable Health Care Act, a.k.a. Obamacare, and while our eyes are on our unstable, erratic…

(photo: Columbia University School of the Arts)

Composer / accordionist / pioneer of electronic music / teacher / music visionary Pauline Oliveros passed away the Friday after Thanksgiving, at the age of 84. In September 2016 - just a few months ago - Pauline Oliveros conducted a workshop at the Karl Berger Creative Music Studio in Big Indian, N.Y., and I was one of the 20 or 25 participants. She was sharp and funny, and she had a fully booked schedule of teaching and performances.

We participants had…

In a strange way, Jimmy Guterman and I went back a long way. Back in the 1980s, I was the office manager for the Boston Phoenix weekly newspaper, and Jimmy wrote record reviews. Back then, for reasons I no longer remember, I decided I didn't like the guy! Maybe I didn't like his musical opinions, or maybe I was sore that he wouldn't review my band, since I was not yet familiar with the concept of "conflict of…

Yesterday, Saturday, July 23, we went to the Ragas Live festival at Pioneer Works in Red Hook. It's a 24-hour presentation of Indian classical music, starting at noon on Saturday and running until today at noon. As you may know, different hours of the day call for particular ragas. For the Ragas Live fest, different groups would perform the ragas that are particular to that raga, 24 performances in 24 hours. The event was produced by WKCR-FM, which also broadcast it.

As we were getting ready to leave her…

Back in 1995, I had only recently switched from bass guitar to keyboard. The band Martin's Folly was just getting off the ground, and we were looking for a keyboard player and couldn't find one, so I switched to keys, temporarily. (That temporary period has lasted for 22 years and counting.)

So in '95 I had been concentrating on the keys for only a year or so. I knew all the major and minor chords and most of the scales, and that was about it.

Eric "Roscoe" Ambel was producing the first Martin's Folly…