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Off-Ramp

Exploring Southern California with John Rabe

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Episodes
  • You sit on the piano bench next to Maestro Jeffrey Kahane ... and talk Bach, clapping (No!), and The Clippers
    Is an NBA team like an orchestra? Does a classical maestro play showtunes? Is it okay to clap between movements? Are major keys happy and minor keys sad? Can Rabe play three notes on the piano?

    For answers, we go back to 2014 to my interview - from the piano bench! - with Maestro Jeffrey Kahane, the affable polymath and world class pianist and conductor. This interview includes an exclusive performance of the Aria from Bach's "Goldberg Variations." Take that, Joe Rogan!

    Support for this podcast comes from Gordon and Dona Crawford, who believe that quality journalism makes Los Angeles a better place to live; and bythe Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.

    Off-Ramp theme music by Fesliyan Studios.

  • Rabe talks with Petros Papadakis, radio's loudest and second smartest host. (Matt "Money" Smith is first.)
    From 2014, Off-Ramp host John Rabe talks with Petros Papadakis, former singing waiter, captain of the USC football team, English major, color commentator, and co-host of "The Petros & Money Show" on AM 570 KLAC.

    At the time, Rabe wrote, "After spending four hours in the KLAC studio in Burbank a couple weeks ago with Petros Papadakis and Matt "Money" Smith, I'm surprised I didn't wake up talking to myself at the Smokehouse, with three or four martinis drained on the table in front of me. It was that weird.  Loud, fast, stream-of-consciousness, sound effects, people talking in the studio when the mike is on. If KPCC is a Prius, the Petros and Money Show is a Camaro clown car."

    Support for this podcast comes from Gordon and Dona Crawford, who believe that quality journalism makes Los Angeles a better place to live; and bythe Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.

    Off-Ramp theme music by Fesliyan Studios.

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  • We sample astronomer Neil deGrasse Tyson's talk last weekend at the Aero Theatre, including his top StarTalk guests ... For Trans Pride: punk singer Drew Arriola Sands, whose career took off after she transitioned ... The California African American Museum's "The Evanesced," inspired by a notorious South LA serial killer, celebrates black women's lives. ... Hank Rosenfeld's card to his late father. We'll hear a poignant Father's Day card from contributor Hank Rosenfeld. Hank plays tape of him and his late father – a World War Two vet and shoe store magnate - driving around their hometown, talking about life.
  • Brian Henson pays tribute to his dad Jim's bawdier side in "Puppet Up! Uncensored" ... the new book "Everything I Need to Know I Learned in the Twilight Zone" ... A restaurant where you're served by our robot overlords ... We talk with the dancing homeless Crenshaw Cowboy by his spaceship ... And rescuing The Formosa Cafe, a piece of Hollywood history. (Photo: Cypress Park, June 2017. John Rabe)
  • When there's something strange in your neighborhood, Vidal and Vicki Herrera might be the closest thing to Ghostbusters you've got... In Redlands there's a circus even PETA would approve of... an exhibit at the Huntington Library looks at Octavia Butler through her own notes and letters she left behind... Taylor Orci guest hosts and she's filled with joy about the whole thing. (Photo: Vidal Herrera)
  • A seeker and a famous son build a city in the High Desert: Ding Le Mei and Lloyd Wright's Institute of Mentalphysics ... John rides in the last B-24 ... Jean-Michel Jarre is in town this weekend: go see him. WARNING: This episode has NO Twin Peaks spoilers. (Photo: David Lynch, 2016, by John Rabe)
  • A new album from the late oddball singer Tiny Tim, who was, among many other things, an astounding musicologist, with a focus on obscure Tin Pan Alley songs. ... A new investigation by NBC4 raises serious questions about possible collusion between the owners of a kids camp and a state agency that oversees toxic sites. ... RIP Keith Mitchell, famous drummer for Mazzy Star, but also the "Buddy Rich of punk rock." (That's him far left in Lynda Burdik photo of The Romans)
  • In the 1950s, saxophonist Big Jay McNeely (left) - now 90 - got teens so excited city officials banned him from LA for a while. ... We go in-depth with Jeffrey Kahane, about to play his final concerts as musical director of the LA Chamber Orchestra. ... 'Anatomy of Innocence,' new collection of memoirs by people who have been exonerated after being jailed for major crimes. ... In “They Shoot Mexicans, Don’t They?,” cultures and personalities clash as a silent film director tries to make a movie at the San Gabriel Mission Playhouse.
  • An Angeleno family going back 3 generations here is considered ancient; but Theresa Chavez is a real Californio, dating back to 1771 when her family owned an original rancho ... How many Romanian restaurants can you name? Add Parsnip in Highland Park to the short list ... We say TOMATO, they say TOMATL: Adolfo Guzman Lopez helps us explore Nahuatl. (Photo: LA Public Library Shades of LA Collection)
  • We talk with residents, eyewitnesses, about those dark days ... Journalist Joe Domanick tells us how decades of police brutality - including hundreds of police murders of blacks and Latinos - led to the LA Riots, and he assesses how far the LAPD has come ... How former Mayor James Hahn could have been Reginald Denny ... Why one yougn Latina who lived through the LA Riots is still happy to call South LA “home" ... and Peter Sagal tells Off-Ramp about his bizarre chance meeting with Chief Gates. And we hear in-depth from the man who was reluctantly at the center of the riots, the late Rodney King.