<html><body><div style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; color: #000000"><div><br></div><div style="color:#000;font-weight:normal;font-style:normal;text-decoration:none;font-family:Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:12pt;"><div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Thinking of Michael Hedges, today. Don't know why. </span></div><div style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; color: #000000"><div><br></div><div>I guess I do know why. Time passes. Love fades. It's that time of year. Autumn.</div><div><br></div><div>I remember while I was a student at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore in the early-1970s watching Michael Hedges perform in a little basement dive called the Peabody Book Store and Beer Stube. It was demolished years ago for a parking lot.</div><div><br></div><div>Another time, I heard him perform at the iconic Fells Point pub, Bertha's. The filmmaker, John Waters, was in the audience. <span style="color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background-color: #ffffff;"> Hedges had been a composition major at </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peabody_Conservatory" title="Peabody Conservatory" class="mw-redirect" style="text-decoration: none; color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background: none #ffffff;" target="_blank">Peabody Conservatory</a><span style="color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background-color: #ffffff;"> in </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baltimore,_Maryland" title="Baltimore, Maryland" class="mw-redirect" style="text-decoration: none; color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background: none #ffffff;" target="_blank">Baltimore</a>, and he supported himself by <span style="color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background-color: #ffffff;">playing and singing in pubs and restaurants in the Baltimore Metro area during his tenure at Peabody. </span></div><div><span style="color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background-color: #ffffff;"><br></span></div><div><span style="color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background-color: #ffffff;">I think he dropped out of Peabody. I'm not sure.</span></div><div><br></div><div>Michael Hedges <span style="color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background-color: #ffffff;">died around this time of year in 1997, at the age of 43, in a car accident along </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Route_128_(California)" title="State Route 128 (California)" class="mw-redirect" style="text-decoration: none; color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background: none #ffffff;" target="_blank">State Route 128</a><span style="color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background-color: #ffffff;"> right here in </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mendocino_County,_California" title="Mendocino County, California" style="text-decoration: none; color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background: none #ffffff;" target="_blank">Mendocino County</a><span style="color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background-color: #ffffff;">, near </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boonville,_California" title="Boonville, California" style="text-decoration: none; color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background: none #ffffff;" target="_blank">Boonville</a>. </div><div><br></div><div>He posthumously won a Grammy. H<span style="color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background-color: #ffffff;">is record "</span><i style="color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background-color: #ffffff;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oracle_(Michael_Hedges_album)" title="Oracle (Michael Hedges album)" style="text-decoration: none; color: #0b0080; background: none;" target="_blank">Oracle</a>"</i><span style="color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background-color: #ffffff;"> won the 1998 </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammy_Award_for_Best_New_Age_Album" title="Grammy Award for Best New Age Album" style="text-decoration: none; color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background: none #ffffff;" target="_blank">Grammy Award for Best New Age Album</a><span style="color: #252525; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 22.4px; background-color: #ffffff;">.</span></div><div><br></div><div>Here's his last concert, two weeks before his death: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4AysS-WN0A" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4AysS-WN0A</a><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4AysS-WN0A" target="_blank"></a></div><div><br></div><div>An absolutely masterful performance. Michael Hedges was touched by fire. On fire. Torched. A human torch.</div><div><br></div><div>On fire with Kundalini. </div><div><br></div><div>The Kundalini Awakening, I'm told it's called by hatha yoga practitioners. </div><div><br></div><div>R.I.P. Michael Hedges..</div><div><br></div></div></div><div><br></div></div></body></html>