Syndicate: 101 Pop!

[kenwhite@well.com (Mark Freeman)]

Mark Freeman here. You either know me or don't, depending on whether you are
a close friend, a friend of a friend, or a person at random I respect and
wanted to include in a list of 100.

	One hundred is the number of contributors I am soliciting for a book on
music, more specifically, a personal history of one hundred years of pop
music in the Americas. Yes, I realize popular music existed before the
current century, but until such breakthroughs as phonograph, radio and MTV,
it lacked the opportunity for total pop diffusion. While the book will cover
the transformation from the days when everyone had a piano in the parlor or
at least a gut-bucket or uke on the front porch to our own end-century
marvels, technology will not be its major focus. 

	Instead, I want to highlight personal stories: what a particular song meant
to someone; how a certain piece of music changed a life; where we were when
such-and-such an album came out; what life was like when we sang that song.
As the 101st writer, I will contribute a narrative that traverses the entire
century, including stories of my own. Your contribution would be one of 100
that illustrates a moment that was key for you.

	Here's all that's needed. A one-page (up to 500 word) recollection from the
history of your experience, connected to one particular piece of music. This
could be about the first record  you ever bought...or a dream concert you
actually attended...or a musing on a song you associate with that certain
someone. It can be sent by mail or e-mail. Or it can be received on a
cassette tape, or even spoken into my answering machine (3 minutes or under
for these last two options). 

	My experience includes 20 years writing on culture and politics for
national publications such as Village Voice, Sierra Magazine, Christopher
Street and Spring: A Journal of Jungian Thought. At home in San Francisco I
produced the KALW radio show "Healing Tales," and have written cover
features for Bay Times, Bay Area Reporter and the pre-corporate-takeover SF
Weekly. I've edited several publications, including an anthology of
religious sex stories and the anti-censorship group's 'zine "Boy With Arms
Akimbo: His Story." As an interviewer, editor and reviewer, I have worked
with a wide range of people, writers and non-writers, helping to make each
of their voices heard. Any editing I do will be checked with you. I can't
promise payment, but will at the very least negotiate from any publisher
copies for each contributor that is included. 

	I'd love to get your contribution as part of a first batch of submissions
by Labor Day of this year. I am looking for a range of material on music
from the 'Teens and 'Twenties (the century's!) and the War Years, as well as
folk, boomer, punk, glitter, rave and the decades of jazz and soul, country,
Afro-Caribbean-Brazilian and all the ethnic musics that continue to
musically miscegenate within our culture. If you would like to suggest
someone else as a contributor, please feel free to pass them a copy of this
call for submissions (and drop me a note with their name and information). 

	
101 POP!	       
respond c/o    Kenwhite@well.com
or to PO Box 77271 San Francisco, Ca. 94102       or 415/821-7479