"If given the choice, today’s youth would choose the Beats over Podhoretz by an overwhelming majority. The older following discovered the Beats in their youth and simply continued to enjoy their literature."

Michael Schumacher: Howlin' Lion Blues…

"Find your own way and remember to find peers and friends to share the burden and the ecstasy of a life in the arts--and thank those who help you. Take advice from elders like me with three grains of salt."

David Cope: Scream With Rhyme & Clarity…

"Music and art can confront and free us from the mind and spirit prison because they  get us out of the cerebral chatter of the frontal lobes and allow our feelings to change instantaneously."

Dennis Formento: Free Mind & Spirit …

"The original utopian ideals resonating in the Chelsea’s halls are the same ideals that informed the creation of the artistic communities downtown."

Sherill Tippins: The Blues of Chelsea Hotel…

"Jazz had a liberating momentum for the Beat writers, with its long-winded improvisation."

Steven Gray: The Barrio of Pagan Socialist

Steven Gray has been living in San…

"I hope that artists continue to be more open and expressive, collaborate more, continue to learn from one another, and are never afraid to express their ideas, no matter the state of politics, war, religion, or whatever else is going on in the world."

Rich Ferguson: The Voice of…

"Music and poetry walk hand in hand."

Michael Dean Odinn Pollock: Life Is A Learning Process 

Composer, writer, poet, producer, performer and multi-artist Michael Dean Odinn Pollock has…

"My hope for the future is that blues will continue to burn brightly as an inspiration for students, artists, and writers. My hope is that the music will continue to shape our lives and our understanding of what is beautiful and true in life."

William Ferris: A Southern…

"Writing is one way of documenting my actual experience—the content and sensations of my life, including my mental life, my emotional life, my physical surroundings, everything I become aware of."

Randy Roark: True sounds from a poet…

"Although seeing appearances as illusion, there is joy, there is delight, there are the blues."

Peter Rowan: Blue(s)grass Sutra

Grammy-award winner and six-time Grammy nominee,…

"I miss most about the Beat family was their willingness to open their houses and lives to us, the next generation’s poets. It was an inspiration to meet people who were artists and that was enough and every conversation was between poets."

Randy Roark: The Lotus of the…

"My hopes for the future are for world peace, love and compassion for all sentient beings and forms of life on this planet." 

Lee Harris: The Underground Alchemist…

"Beat writing was to a certain extent influenced by Black music and speech patterns in the manner of its composition which could be compared to oral improvisation, a kind of lively street corner jive."

Pat Nolan: Nualláin Roadhouse Blues…

"Music is the food of love and if I hadn’t been a psychologist I would have been a musician."

Ralph Metzner, Ph.D.: The Blues of Earth

Ralph Metzner, Ph.D. who has a B.A. in philosophy and psychology…

"The Beats have a youthful way of looking at life and questioning the status quo, which is why youth will always be attracted to them."

Mellon Tytell: Outside The Comfort…

"Music was all that was important before I began writing. Was what I did...and that was okay. This was years between beats and hippys...we were just college kids getting high and listening to jazz and blues and hillbilly stuff."

Jim McCrary:…

"When I take a good picture, it’s a very satisfying feeling and I feel that my efforts have paid off."

Indra B. Tamang: 

The…

"The art world is independent from the larger world. Art is autonomous. It flows forward in unexpected ways. It should surprise its beholders."

Michael Andre: Years Skip By Like a Stone Across a Pond…

"Both the Blues (in music) and the Beats (in words) did the same: expressions in words and music of the human condition in all its glory."

Richard Barone: The spirit of New York

Richard Barone is an acclaimed…

"Living life one ‘in the moment at a time; death is just a breath away."

Hammond Guthrie: Classic of Changes 

Hammond Guthrie is a well traveled painter and author currently living in Portland,…