David Meltzer has been a central poet in the San Francisco and national poetry scene for decades. The youngest poet associated with the West Coast Beats, he was also a key figure in the San Francisco Renaissance that preceded it. He has published over twenty books of poetry and prose and edited collections relating to birth, death, ancient songs, Kaballah, and jazz. Meltzer also founded and edited Tree Magazine, pioneering explorations of Kabbalah and other forms of Jewish mysticism.
Meltzer was raised in Brooklyn during the World War II years; performed on radio and early TV on the Horn and Hardart Children's Hour. He moved to L.A. at 16 and at 17 enrolled in an ongoing academy with artists Wallace Berman, George Herms, Robert Alexander, Cameron; he migrated to San Francisco in l957 for higher education with peers and maestros like Jack Spicer, Robert Duncan, Joanne Kyger, Diane DiPrima, Michael McClure, Lew Welch, Philip Whalen, Jack Hirschman, a cast of thousands all living extraordinary ordinary lives. Beat Thing [La Alameda Press, 2004] won the Josephine Miles PEN Award in 2005. He was editor and interviewer for San Francisco Beat: Talking With The Poets [City Lights, 2001].
He currently teaches in the graduate MA/MFA Poetics program at New College of California, as well as in the school's undergraduate Humanities program. With Steve Dickison, he co-edits Shuffle Boil, a magazine devoted to music in all its appearances and disappearances. David's Copy, selected poems, was published in 2005 by Viking/Penguin. David Meltzer: Poetry W/ Jazz, 1958, was recently issued by Sierra Records.
Michael Rothenberg is a poet, songwriter, and editor of Big Bridge magazine online at www.bigbridge.org. His poetry books include Nightmare Of The Violins, Man/Woman, a collaboration with Joanne Kyger, Favorite Songs, The Paris Journals, Monk Daddy, Grown Up Cuba, and Unhurried Vision. He is also author of the novel Punk Rockwell.
Rothenberg's 2005 CD collaboration with singer Elya Finn was praised by poet David Meltzer as, "fabulous-all [the] songs sound like Weimar Lenya and postwar Nico, lushly affirmative at the same time being edged with cosmic weltschmertz. An immensely tasty production." He is also editor for the Penguin Poet series, which includes selected works of Philip Whalen, Joanne Kyger, David Meltzer and Ed Dorn. He has recently completed the Collected Poems of Philip Whalen for Wesleyan University Press.
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