John
My blogs
- Michigan Merit Curriculum Visual, Performing, and Applied Arts High School Blog
- The state of michigan arts and culture
| Gender | Male |
|---|---|
| Industry | Government |
| Location | Lansing, MI |
| Introduction | I have been Executive Director of MCACA since June of 2006, after having served as Director of Programs for MCACA from 1998. Prior to MCACA, I worked for the State of Michigan Liquor Control Commission where I worked on statewide as well as national campaigns. I was also appointed as an ad hoc Ombudsman for the Commission during the privatization of its warehousing operations. Before my state service, I spent nine years as a journalist, working as a reporter, news editor and managing editor, and prior to that I spent over nine years working on the assembly line at the General Motors Truck Assembly plant in Flint, most of that time was spent in the paint department, although I did my share of spot welding in the cab shop. I attended the University of Michigan in Flint where, after playing around with music theory and composition, I earned a degree in Philosophy, concentrating in aesthetics. My graduate work has been in liberal studies concentrating in American Culture. |
| Interests | Beyond the arts in general, I enjoy writing (and occasionally publicly reading) poetry, I am a baseball fan and lately I’ve been listening to a lot of world music, in particular Flamenco. I am married to Dianne... don’t ask me how I lucked out there. We have two children Denise and Dan, a daughter-in-law, Amy, and one incredible grandchild, Hailey. |
| Favorite Movies | My top ten: Citizen Kane, A Clockwork Orange, Sons of the Desert, Lawrence of Arabia, Raiders of the Lost Ark, 12 Monkies, Duck Soup, The Graduate, Five Easy Pieces, Cinema Paradiso |
| Favorite Music | My top ten albums; Kind of Blue by Miles Davis, Beethoven’s 9th Symphony (any recording of this), Abbey Road by the Beattles, Frank Zappa’s Yellow Shark (actually any FZ did!), 57 Minutos con la Realidad by Astor Piazzolla, Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd, Ziggy Stardust by David Bowie, Exodus by Bob Marley, Suite Bergamasque by Claude Debussy (any recording), Hejira by Joni Mitchell |
| Favorite Books | My top ten: The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkein, Ulysses by James Joyce, Being and Nothingness by Jean Paul Sartre, Michael Robartes and the Dancer (includes the poem The Second Coming) by W.B. Yeats, A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole, Breakfast of Champions by Kurt Vonnegut, 1984 by George Orwell, Plato’s Republic, Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein, The Caged Owl by Gregory Orr |