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‘The Old Man’s Musings – 45 Years of Gigs’

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When Nook Schoenfeld was 14, his dad bought him a ticket to his first concert: The Doors at Madison Square Garden. Intrigued by the crew, he recalls thinking, “I wanted to be one of those people running all over resetting mics at set change.” Realizing his goal, he went on to tour with some of music’s biggest names as he climbed the ladder to lighting designer and along the way gathered some great stories, which he has now put into a book. The Old Man’s Musings—45 years of gigs: Short stories from the road is funny, absorbing, and chock full of live entertainment history through his firsthand accounts.

The book is selling well on Amazon and has climbed to the top of the Theater Direction & Production category. Proceeds from sales are being spread between four charities connected to Schoenfeld’s two sons. Hunter, 23, is autistic and doing well thanks to Clearbrook of Arlington Heights, Il and The Anderson Center for Autism in Staatsburg, NY. Lenny, 13, has ADHD and is also thriving because of The Arete Academy for twice exceptional kids in Minneapolis, MN. The fourth charity is the Schoenfeld Children’s trust.

Why this book, why now?
Here is Nook’s Author Note from the book:

I’ve been writing stories since I was in grade school. To all that have seen me at venues, I’m usually carrying the current novel Im reading while waiting to work. I went to college to become a journalist and wrote show reviews for the university paper. Somehow, I also ended up working for the local stage crew and through a vast network, I eventually hustled from an audio guy to a lighting tech, to a lighting director, and on to production designer. Later, it was my education at the university as a young man that enabled me to walk away from touring and transfer to a full-time job as a magazine editor and part time lighting guy. 45 years in a nutshell.

My biggest accomplishment was not the shows I worked on over these years. It’s all the teaching I passed on to younger people who just needed a step up or a chance to program that opening act and run with it. Some of those have become big time designers in their own right and I glow inside when I read of their exploits.

For eight years I wrote a column called The LD@Large. I was grateful for Terry Lowe the publisher of PLSN magazine, for allowing me to blow off steam while also teaching readers lighting tricks and tips, often posing as satire. Come October 2020 I had become Covid bored, as most of us did around this time. I started reminiscing about all the barely believable stunts we pulled off doing shows. I put pen to paper so to speak and jotted down some short stories that we can all laugh at now, years later.

Over time, people started sharing my Old Man Musings on social media sites and I just took to posting them in different groups—a new one every Friday. They have been shared globally with some 60 stories posted. The amount of requests for a book last year were too many to ignore, so here you have it. Version 1.

Special thanx to my editor and good pal Joe Fucini for helping me assemble this book. I couldn’t have done it without you pushing me and making my writing better. And to Mary Lou, my wonderful wife, and the best partner a fella could ask for, who always encourages me to write. And to my two fine sons, Hunter and Lenny, both exceptional lads in their own way.—Nook Schoenfeld