Willa!

              Willa! (photo by Amy Jurist)

I don't know what you were doing when you were 14, but I don't hear good things so let's keep that part of your history in the past. At 14 going on 15, the SJG was doing time in the big white wicker chair in my bedroom, listening to Joni Mitchell and Laura Nyro and writing what can only be charitably described as "poetry," sort of a stream-of-consciousness exploration of my tender soul. From time to time, when my parents made me, I also subjected loved ones and dinner guests to my guitar playing and artistic interpretation of "Jamaica Farewell." At 14, Willa, a lovely and talented singer-songwriter, and the daughter of my first cuzzie Andy Kaplan and his wife Allison, a gal I call Sissy, and vice versa, is performing her own songs with professional musicians backing her up. And she did just that last night, with such poise and command, at Genghis Cohen in an SRO room filled with friends and kvelling family members. I can't wait to see where this gifted gal, my first cuzzie once removed, removed from what, I can't tell you, goes next. I only hope Willa takes me with her, either as her road manager, as long as she handles the directions and schlepping of the equipment, or better yet, Director of Merchandise.  

Pretty Chinese lanterns at Genghis Cohen