East of Eden Band

The East of Eden Band was considered to be among the best practitioners of the poetry and music genre performance poetry. It produced a number of cassette-only releases that circulated among the outlets of the cassette revolution distribution network during the 1980s. Some of the sites where "East of Eden Band" is listed include some radio stations where the band's poetry and music were in high in rotation, like [http://www.wfmu.org/~bart/Playlists/b.990510.html] and a cassette archive [http://www.halcyon.com/robinja/mythos/k7arc.html] .

The lead vocalist and poet for the band was Hedwig Gorski (who often used the name Hedwig G-G) is described as a "charismatic" character by "The Austin Chronicle". Her husband, musician D'Jalma Garnier III, composed individual musical pieces for each poem. He invented a notation system over the texts of the poems to provide a musical sheet music for Gorski's spoken vocals. Original East of Eden Band members include Booka Michel on percussion, Argentinian Horatio Rodriguez on bass, and Garnier on guitar. All are professional musicians in jazz and other genres of music. Only Michel continues to perform in Austin, Texas. Rodriguez died in New York City in 2005 and is buried in Argentina. Garnier and Gorski live in Louisiana.

At one point, the band changed personnel and played with Donny Silverman, who also performed with the legendary Townes Van Zandt. The new configuration used the band name Early Breakfast with Hedwig Gorski after the play title by Jon Westerfield for his Angel Theater. He wrote a series of theatrical vignettes under that title. Using Gorski's name for the title of his play was a way to show gratitude for her mentoring of his talents during some very dark times for the playwright.

Many of the East of Eden Band recordings were made from live radio broadcasts on KUT-FM radio at the University of Texas at Austin, where the studios for Austin City Limits television broadcasts are also taped.

External links

Performance poem title by East of Eden Band recorded live on KUT-FM radio. "From Box to Living Room to Box" spoken vocals by Hedwig Gorski, music composed by D'Jalma Garnier
* [http://indieonestop.com/jamroom/bands/391/entry.php "Listen to audio of poem"]