Madison BookBeat

Stu Levitan welcomes Madison native Michael Massey, the award-winning composer, songwriter, pianist and performer whose musical resume include co-founding the bands Chaser and Boys in White, writing the score to the Madison Ballet production Dracula: A Rock Ballet, being a featured performer in the Mad Cabaret, Furious Bongos and Piano Fondue, releasing several solo albums including Be Careful How you Say Pianist, the Present and Attack of the Delicious, and perhaps his greatest musical accomplishment, one in which I actually played a small part, as a ringer for the legendary garage band Johnny and the Nakomans. He lives with his wife Robin in a house they just built on the driftless prairie outside Barneveld WI, on land that’s been in his family for eleven decades. Mike got drunk for the first time in August 1973 on a trip to Houston with the choir from Trinity Lutheran Church. He would get drunk a lot over the next 20 years before he took his last drink on October 13, 1993. He writes about those twenty years of alcoholism, and the 29 years of sobriety in a moving and powerful memoir entitled More, just out from the good people at Little Creek Press. Along with a number of Michael’s lyrics, there are some great archival photos – including two with Andy Warhol, the subject of one of Chaser’s songs. With its narrative of recovery and redemption, it is a very appropriate book to feature as we start a new year, and it is a pleasure to welcome to Madison BookBeat my friend Michael Massey.

Stu Levitan welcomes veteran sportswriter and Madison native Dennis Punzel for a conversation about his new book about the Wisconsin Volleyball team, Point Wisconsin! The Road to a National Title for Kelly Sheffield & The Wisconsin Badgers. It’s a book he was largely able to research while at his day job, covering the Badger team for the Wisconsin State Journal  since 2013, part of his 37 year career with the State Journal and the Capital Times, following seven years with papers in Green Bay, Stevens Point and Boise Idaho.

Madison BookBeat host Angie Trudell Vasquez interviews Nikki Wallschlaeger (https://nikkiwallschlaeger.com/) on Waterbaby, her third collection of poetry. Poems read include poems on Black motherhood, ending capitalism, the historic lunch counters of the United States, and how Woodland Pattern in Milwaukee brings poets together and shapes us.

Part two of Stu Levitan’s conversation with one of the most interesting and politically important UW graduates from the late sixties, Helen Shiller. Her career encompassed almost 30 years of civic activism and community organizing with the Black Panther Party, the Students for a Democratic Society, the Intercommunal Survival Committee, and 24 years as a member of the Chicago City Council. Studs Terkel included some oral history from Helen as a chapter in his book Hope Dies Last, and now she’s written a full memoir of her time on the streets and in the suites. It’s called Daring to Struggle Daring to Win: Five Decades of Resistance in Chicago’s Uptown Community from the good people at Haymarket Books. It has been quite a life and career, and it is quite a memoir — enough for two episodes of Madison BookBeat. The first aired an Nov. 28; as we pick up part two, Helen is reflecting on why she did not join the Weatherman when the Students for a Democratic Society split in 1969.Airdate - Dec. 12, 2022

Stu Levitan welcomes one of the most interesting and politically important UW graduates from the late sixties, Helen Shiller, whose career encompassed almost 30 years of civic activism and community organizing with the Black Panther Party, the Students for a Democratic Society, the Intercommunal Survival Committee, and 24 years as a member of the Chicago City Council. nteresting and important, enough so for the legendary Studs Terkel to include Helen’s oral history as a chapter in his book Hope Dies Last. Helen has written a memoir of her time on the streets and in the suites. It’s called Daring to Struggle Daring to Win: Five Decades of Resistance in Chicago’s Uptown Community from the good people at Haymarket Books. It has been quite a life and career, and it is quite a memoir. And it is quite a pleasure to welcome to Madison BookBeat Helen Shiller

This week, host Angie Trudell Vasquez speaks with local writer Tegan Nia Swanson (https://teganniaswanson.org/) about her debut novel, Things We Found When the Water Went Down (December 2022, Catapult Co). Described as a dark and ethereal eco-noir infused with magical realism, Things We Found When the Water Went Down examines power, identity, and myth in a story of murder and disappearance. You can find out more about the author here (https://teganniaswanson.org/bio/).

Stu Levitan welcomes WORT’S own Frank Emspak about his new memoir Troublemaker: Saying No to Power.WORT listeners probably know Frank as a co-founder and producer of Madison Labor Radio, right here every Friday at 5:30 since January 1998. You may know him as a co-founder and executive producer of the syndicated Workers Independent News, which broadcast every weekday from 2002 to 2017. Or maybe you know him as Professor Emeritus at the University of Wisconsin School for Workers, where he taught from 1991 to 2008.And those of you of a certain age, or who have read your history books, may recall his service in the sixties as chair of the UW Socialist Club then chair of the National Coordinating Committee to End the War in Vietnam, member of the steering committee and lead organizer of Madison Citizens for a Vote on Vietnam then a successful doctoral candidate in the history department.But in the 20 years or so between those two Madison eras of academics, activism and communications, a sojourn in Massachusetts wearing different colored collars as a hospital lab technician, skilled machinist and foundry worker.And in each professional iteration, he has taken after his father and been a class-conscious union leader, here as President of United Faculty and Academic Staff Local 223, and in Massachusetts as Executive Board member and steward of competing unions, first at the largest shoe machine manufacturer in the country, then at a GE plant.All in all, it has been quite a life, making Troublemaker quite a book. It's a great pleasure to welcome Dr. Frank Emspak to Madison BookBeat.

Stu Levitan welcomes Peter Fauerbach, the namesake and great-great-grandson of the founder of the brewing company that is synonymous with Madison, for a discussion of his award-winning, lavishly illustrated new book, Fauerbach Brewing Company Madison Wisconsin 1848-1967. The elder Peter Fauerbach was born in Bavaria in 1830, emigrated to the United State in 1850, working in and running breweries in upstate NY, and the young Wisconsin towns of Portage and New Lisbon. He made it to Madison in 1868 to lease the Sprecher Brewery at Blount and Williamson streets. By 1880 it was the Fauerbach Brewing Company, a mainstay of Madison life until it closed July 1, 1966. The brewery was torn down December 13, 1967, and the site was later developed by David and Leigh Mollenhoff as the Fauerbach Condominium.Among Peter’s descendants with an important role in the company’s history – his grandson Karl H., general manager from Prohibition until 1960, and Karl H’s son Karl P., master brewer from 1957 until the final keg nine years later. Although our Peter Fauerbach was only 14 when the brewery closed, he is uniquely qualified to tell the Fauerbach story. After all, Karl H was his grandfather, Karl P his father. And it was his great-uncle Dr. Louis who made and implemented the decision to close the brewery. No wonder that he has become the unofficial company historian.Peter Fauerbach has degrees in physics and math from St. Olaf College in Minnesota and a master’s in industrial engineering from the university of Wisconsin. Naturally, with that academic background, he spent his career as a health care consultant, with a particular focus on hospital relocations. He lives near Spring Harbor on Madison’s west side with his wife, Maggie Zoeller.

In this edition of Madison BookBeat, host Angie Trudell Vasquez speaks with local author Maggie Ginsberg. Her debut novel “Still True,” set in a fictional Wisconsin town, was just published by the University of Wisconsin Press.It’s a novel that explores the messiness of family, relationships and alcoholism in a small Wisconsin town. Ginsberg joins Bookbeat to read excerpts of the book, and share how the characters changed and came to life over the course of five years.Maggie Ginsberg is a senior editor at Madison Magazine, and her writing has appeared at a variety of city, regional and national publications. “Still True” is her debut work of fiction. You can find her online at maggieginsberg.com (maggieginsberg.com) and follow her on Twitter @maggieginsberg (https://twitter.com/maggieginsberg?).

In this episode of Madison BookBeat, host Jonas Gomez Tijerino speaks with local poet Shahayra Majumder (https://www.instagram.com/shahayramajumder/?hl=en), author of the new chapbook, The Unreliable Narrator Wakes Up. They discuss the process of publishing independently and the themes of loss of innocence and navigating adulthood.About the guest:Shahayra Majumder is a Madison transplant, hailing originally from West Palm Beach, Florida. She earned a Bachelor of Science in Applied Biomoleculor Sciences and a Minor in Mathematics from the University of Florida in Gainesville. In 2019, she moved to Madison for work.. Since then she has held roles as a Technical Solutions Engineer for Epic, Solution Engineer for Included Health, and, most recently, Sales Engineer for Myndshft. The Unreliable Narrator Wakes Up is Shahayra’s first published collection.