Tag: Reviews
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Music Album Review: ‘Casablanca – Original Motion Picture Soundtrack’
Casablanca â Original Motion Picture Soundtrack Labels: Turner Classic Movies Music/Rhino (1997);Sony Music (Reissue) Year of Release: 1997 (Original), 2010 (Sony Music reissue) Genre: Film Score/Standards/Spoken Word đś Casablanca Soundtrack: Memory, Melody, and the Music of Longing Of all the soundtrack albums Iâve collected over the years, none is quite as hauntingâor as structurally unusualâas…
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Movie Review: ‘Not Another Teen Movie’ (2001)
Not Another Teen Movie (2001) Written by: Mike Bender, Adam Jay Epstein, Andrew Jacobson, Phil Beauman, and Buddy Johnson Directed by: Joel Gallen Starring: Chyler Leigh, Chris Evans, Jaime Pressly, Eric Christian Olsen, Eric Jungmann, Mia Kirshner, Deon Richmond, Cody McMains, Sam Huntington, Samm Levine, Cerina Vincent, Ron Lester, Randy Quaid, Lacey Chabert, Riley Smith…
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Echoes of Emotion: What a Thoughtful Review Reveals About ‘Reunion: Coda’
đŹ Echoes of Emotion: What a Thoughtful Review Reveals About Reunion: Coda When Thomas Wikman reviewed Reunion: Coda on his Leonberger Life blog, I expected kindness. What I didnât expect was emotional precisionâthe kind that doesnât just summarize a book but listens to its heartbeat. Thomas called it âa love story complicated by life.â That…
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A Writer’s Life: Refreshing My Amazon Author Profile
đ ď¸ A Quiet Update: Refreshing My Amazon Author Profile Last night, I made a small but meaningful update to my Amazon Author Profile. It wasnât a major overhaulâjust a refinement to better reflect the scope and emotional focus of my work. These kinds of updates often go unnoticed, but they matter. Theyâre part of the…
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Music Album Review: ‘Great Performances: Rodrigo: Concierto de Aranjuez/Fantasia para un gentilhombre’
đź Echoes of Spain: A Journey Through Rodrigo and AlbĂŠniz with John Williams Thereâs something quietly transcendent about hearing the guitar sing in the hands of John Williams. Not the film composer, but the Australian virtuoso whose fingers seem to coax memory itself from the strings. In Great Performances: Rodrigo: Concierto de Aranjuez/Fantasia para un…
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Comings and Goings: The Art of Being Seen â A Garratyverse Reflection on Memory, Music, and Emotional Truth
Comings and Goings: The Art of Being Seen â A Garratyverse Reflection on Memory, Music, and Emotional Truth Thereâs a moment in the closing voiceover of Summer of â42 that lingers long after the credits roll: âLife is made up of comings and goings. And for everything we take with us, thereâs something we leave…
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Music Appreciation: My First Encounter with Berlioz’s ‘Symphonie Fantastique’
đź A Fever Dream in Five Movements: Remembering My First Encounter with Berliozâs Symphonie Fantastique One of the most memorable experiences from my college yearsânow four decades agoâtook place on a rare cool afternoon in South Florida. I was sitting in my Humanities class at Miami-Dade Community College, where Professor Jay Brown, a talented musician…
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Book Review: ‘Close-up on Sunset Boulevard: Billy Wilder, Norma Desmond, and the Dark Hollywood Dream’
Close-up on Sunset Boulevard: Billy Wilder, Norma Desmond, and the Dark Hollywood Dream By: Sam Staggs Publisher: St. Martinâs Griffin Publication Year: 2003 Genre(s): Film history, Making of Sunset Boulevard, Hollywood history, Classic cinema đŹ Book Review: Close-Up on Sunset Boulevard by Sam StaggsEven if youâve never seen the film, the drama behind it is…
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On Writing and Storytelling: ‘Comings and Goings’ Gets a New Review on Amazon UK!
Across the Pond: Comings and Goings Receives Its First International Review Some mornings begin quietlyâbut this week, one brought a small, extraordinary ripple. Comings and Goings â The Art of Being Seen just received its first international review, courtesy of Amazon UK. Meg Learner, a thoughtful reader and longtime fan of Jim Garraty’s journey, offered…
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Music Album Review: ‘Billy Joel – 52nd Street’
52nd Street Revisited: Billy Joel and the Art of Returning Thereâs something hauntingly familiar about the first album that makes you feel seen. For me, it was 52nd Streetâacquired through teenage negotiation, a bulky eight-track cassette wrested from my sister when she moved out. At the time, âMy Lifeâ felt like rebellionâs anthem, its defiance…
