James' World 2

Havilah Roman on keyboard

I recently had the privilege of interviewing a family that has incorporated music in their lives the way that other families engage in Saturday morning chores.

It was so moving to see 3-year old Joshua Roman play the congas. During the interview, his parents Billy and Havilah talked about the importance of encouraging children, but refraining from directing them too much.

The conversation reminded me why A-Spot Magazine is so important to me. I realized that music is a communication, a way of expressing one’s feelings, ideas and perceptions.

As I watched Joshua, I realized that he enjoyed communicating with the congas. Maybe for a 3-year old, it’s more important. Even an adult sometimes does not have the vocabulary to express complex feelings. A child certainly does not. But if a child can use music to tell a story, then much less goes unsaid.

This phase…

Ozark is a television crime drama series created by Bill Dubuque and Mark Williams for Netflix and produced by Media Rights Capital.  Bateman is a director and executive producer for the series. Ozark is about a married couple who relocate their family to the Ozarks for the purpose of money laundering. It took a minute but I finally fell hard for Ozark, completing binge-watching it in record time.

After a money-laundering scheme for a Mexican drug cartel goes wrong, financial advisor Martin “Marty” Byrde (Jason Bateman) proposes to make amends by offering to set up a bigger laundering operation in the Lake of the Ozarks region of central Missouri. Marty suddenly relocates his family; wife Wendy (Laura Linney), daughter Charlotte (Sofia Hublitz), and their son Jonah (Skylar Gaertner) from the Chicago suburb of Naperville to the remote summer resort community of Osage Beach, Missouri. Thinking Osage Beach is uncorrupt, waiting…

Jingle Jangle: A Christmas Journey is a Christmas musical fantasy film written and directed by David E. Talbert. I was a little reluctant to see this movie because it appeared to be a children’s film.  I was correct — albeit a children’s film, it was an exceptional children’s film.

An eccentric toymaker named Jeronicus Jangle (Forest Whitaker) and his adventurous granddaughter Journey (Madalen Mills), construct a magical invention in this imaginary world which, if they can get it to work in time for the holidays, could change Jeronicus and his family’s lives forever.

Jeronicus employs an apprentice named Gustafson (Keegan-Michael Key) who betrays the toymaker along with a new toy called Don Juan Diego (voice: Ricky Martin), causing Jeronicus to lose his ability to believe in himself and to also mistrust anyone who comes into his presence, for years to come.  Meanwhile, a magical invention called Buddy 3000…