Deanna Gobio tells the story of getting her first tattoo when she was 79 years old. Then Max talks to Raffi about his musical roots, how he learned to embrace his career as a children’s musician, and how it feels to keep playing songs like “Baby Beluga” to thousands of adoring kids and their families after all these years.
Know someone who should be on 70 Over 70? We’re looking for all types of stories and people to feature at the top of the show. To nominate yourself or someone else, email 70over70@pineapple.fm or call 302-659-7070 and tell us your name, age, where you’re from and what you want to talk about.
transcription
[PRE-ROLL]
[OPENING MONTAGE]
Madeleine Albright: I know this program is 70 Over 70, but I really wish I were younger. I wish I was 70…but, I am ready!
[THEME MUSIC STARTS]
William: I’m 72 years old.
Paula: I’m 75, miraculously enough.
Sandy: I am 83 years old.
Betty: I am 88 years old.
James: You know, I’m here at 92.
Lucia: I’ll be 94 in May.
Donalda: I’m 101 years old.
Deanna Gobio: My name is Deanna Gobio. I am 82 years old and I live in New York City.
[THEME MUSIC FADES OUT]
Deanna: When I was growing up I didn't like my name at all. My Chinese name is Shu Lien. It means delicate lotus. I felt like it's too, too soft, too-too-too feminine, and it was...it was just not me.
[MUSIC FADES IN]
Deanna: When I was in high school, college, I was always teased and I was always called the ugly duckling. And they would give me all kinds of names like, “Oh, you’re a tomboy. You could never get married because, uh, nobody-nobody would want you for a daughter in-law.” So that was-that was really always a struggle.
[MUSIC CONTINUES]
Deanna: My feelings for my Chinese name changed many, many years later when I was working for a bank and I was covering the,uh, emerging markets and, uh, a client came to visit and we exchanged business cards. I had my Chinese name printed on the back of my business card, so when this, uh, client saw my Chinese name, he-he was so animated! I was so surprised. And,uh, he says “What a beautiful name. Do you know what it means?” I said “Yeah, you know, it symbolizes purity.” And he says, “Wait, there is a very famous, uh, poem, just two lines. And-and basically it says, uh, ‘Out of the mud, rises beauty untainted.’ There's no mud, there's no lotus.” And then from that time on, I started to appreciate what my Chinese name means.
[MUSIC FADES OUT]
Deanna: After I started to really totally appreciate my name, I wanted to have a tattoo of the lotus. I kind of, like, said, “Before I die, I have to have that tattoo.” And, uh, it was not until I was almost 80 that I found the-the perfect tattoo artist. And, uh, the night I went there, I was the oldest person in the tattoo shop! But my tattoo is a constant reminder that you don't have to be girly to be beautiful. You could be a beautiful person by being yourself. I went through struggle for my identity, my, uh, sexual orientation. But now at 82 I feel totally comfortable with myself because to really accept myself…
[THEME MUSIC STARTS]
Deanna: And really rejoice in it, it is the best thing that I’ve done for myself.
Max Linsky: That was Deanna Gobio and from Pineapple Street Studios, this is 70 Over 70, a show about making the most of the time we have left. I'm Max Linsky.
[THEME MUSIC CONTINUES]
Max: My guest this week is Raffi, who has been playing music for kids and their families for nearly 50 years.
Raffi was born in Cairo and moved to Canada when he was 10.
[THEME MUSIC FADES OUT]
Max: As a teenager, he fell in love with The Beatles, and Joni Mitchell, and Pete Seeger. He wanted to be a folk singer himself, and started playing in coffee shops around Toronto.
But it was a struggle. And just as he was preparing to abandon that dream, he discovered that he was really good at playing music for kids. And he’s been doing that ever since. The same songs — Baby Beluga, Down by the Bay, Banana Phone — over and over again, on stages all around the globe.
[MUSIC FADES IN]
Max: I wanted to understand what he’s still getting out of it after all this time, and what he’s learned about the way that children see the world.
Raffi is 73 years old.
INTERVIEW
Max: Raffi, I, uh, can't believe I'm getting to talk to you, this is so exciting!
Raffi: I can't believe it either. [laughs]
Max: Well, here's two people who can't believe it. I got to tell you, I got two little kids and, uh, I told them what I was doing this morning, and it was the first time they've been at all impressed with me ever. [Raffi laughs] You are a true, true celebrity to those two. They couldn't believe that I was getting the chance to talk to you.
Raffi: How old are they?
Max: Uh, six and two.
Raffi: Oh, wonderful. And their names are?
Max: Uh, the older one is Guy and the younger one is Noah. Uhh, but that's enough talking about my kids! I'm interested in you as a kid, Raffi, what was your childhood like?
Raffi: I was observant [laughs], I didn't miss a thing.
Max: Really?
Raffi: Oh, yeah. Yeah. I took in a lot of detail and I wrote about this in my autobiography that's called um, The Life of a Children's Troubadour. I wrote about, um, what I remembered of my boyhood growing up in Cairo, Egypt. I was born into an Armenian family. So I describe in great detail [laughs] what the-the parlor room in our apartment looked like and how the-the Sunday trips to the pyramids for lunch at Cafe Vue de Pyramid was like. The Cairo sands under my little feet, little Raffi's feet [laughs]. And, uh, it was both wonderful in the sense that I knew that I was loved greatly. But the bewilderment was that I didn't feel respected for who I felt I was. There was too much mocking and disrespectful, you know, language and, you know, physical pain, you know, in terms of, uh, discipline and so on that were...that were not fine with me.
Max: Yeah.
Raffi: I was--I'm not saying that mistreated me all the time. Don't get me wrong. Clearly, we had wonderful times and so on, but the inconsistency, the contrast, I found all that a great bewilderment.
Max: Were you able to understand that as a child?
Raffi: No, you can't. You're bewildered. You say to yourself, well, if they love me so much and clearly they do, I feel it. Why are they mistreating me?
Max: When things would get tense, when there were moments of tension with your parents, how did you escape? How did you protect yourself?
Raffi: Oh, well, you know, there were all kinds of diversions like, you know, my--play with my sister and brother. Uh, we had music playing all the time on our high fidelity sound system. [both laugh]
Max: Do you remember the songs that helped get you through?
Raffi: They were the pop music of the day, uh, the titles of which I don't know. But I just have melodies. They weren't children's songs, in other words, so much.
Max: Were their children's songs in your life then?
Raffi: Uh, there were a couple of them, you know, lullabies here and there--by my mother, I imagine. But they didn't feel like they, you know, took a big place in my childhood. But when I got to be doing this work with children, music for children, I actually had to learn word for word children's classics such as Bah-Bah Blacksheep [both laugh] and Mary Had a Little Lamb.
Max: Yeah.
Raffi: I mean, I was a folk singer before as a children's entertainer, and my folk singing music chops actually helped me when I began to entertain families. But, you know, it's interesting. I mean, when I look back on my life, it feels like there have been two or three or four different periods where I was just, you know, almost different people. Of course, you're never really different people, you're just going through phases of your life, you know?
Max: Yeah.
Raffi: I think that's true for everybody.
Max: Well, let's talk about the, uh, the phase when you were an aspiring folk artist.
Raffi: Must we? [laughs]
Max: Yeah! Yeah, we must.
Raffi: Well, I sang--I sang at coffeehouses in Toronto and all across Canada. But, you know, I was often nervous on stage and I--for whatever the reasons are--you know, my performances never really, uh, succeeded the way I hoped they would.
Max: What was your ambition? What did--what did you want?
Raffi: Well, I wanted to be another James Taylor, another Bruce Cockburn. I was so enthralled with Joni Mitchell songs and Gordon Lightfoot songs and Bob Dylan and so on, you know, so I was just trying to make it as a singer-songwriter.
Max: Yeah, I know. I read your book and there's some descriptions in there of these--of these bar shows that you used to play.
Raffi: Yeah...
Max: It's hard for me to imagine even having, like, heard you talk about a little bit, like it's hard for me to imagine you, like, singing to a bunch of people drinking.
Raffi: [laughs] But then-then you have to remember, I was, like, 21 years old or 23 and I had long hair and a headband and, you know, it was the hippie period. And I was, uh, you know, I wasn't a hippie, but I was kind of like being a wannabe hippie at the time. It was my way of individuating from, uh, my family experience, finding my own voice. And when you do that, you experiment. That's what-that's what I was doing, my folk singing career.
Max: When you had long hair and you're playing coffeehouses and bars in Toronto, what were you writing about?
Raffi: Just life, love songs, whatever.
Max: [laughs] It wasn't--it wasn’t, uh, there wasn't like a big, uh, Raffi message at that point.
Raffi: No. But when the idea of making it an album for young children came up, that album became a hit and became a gold record and so on. I sort of came to see that making music for young children was as worthy a pursuit as making music for anybody, and in fact, that it was important work for what it offered the very young.
Max: Yeah.
Raffi: They're the most impressionable. They don't call those years formative for nothing. ‘Cause what's forming is nothing less than how it feels to be human, that's what's forming. It behooves all of us to gain an understanding of how they actually set the tone of being for a lifetime of outcomes. So you want those first experiences for the human child to be life affirming, positive, supportive, nourished, that's what you want, so that the lifetime of outcomes is as positive and possibility laden as it can be. I'm, uh, far more interested in talking about my--the music of recent, you know, 43 years of making music for children and families because there's so much to say about that. And that's-that's where my interest is. It-it just doesn't thrill me to spend too much time about the early years because there isn't a whole lot to say more than what I've said. I-I don't mean to be disrespectful, um, Max.
Max: No, not at all. I wouldn't, uh, I wouldn't take it that way at all, though, is it just proportions for you, like-like you've just spent so much of your life doing this work that talking about your life before the work is just not that interesting to you?
Raffi: Well, I suppose it's kind of that way. Look, we live in really intriguing and troubling times [Certainly.] Uh, that require our full response. You know, and uh, what's really important to me is this historic time that we're living through on a world that's heating up such that our very futures and the futures of your two darling kids are in jeopardy. I mean, that-that's really the kind of conversation that for me has an urgency to it, has an interest to it. And how my music for children and the tens of millions of Beluga grads [both laugh] might somehow help in these times. That's the kind of stuff that I-I love to consider and to talk about.
Max: Well, I certainly want to talk about all that. I wasn't trying to give you the impression that I didn't and the, uh, the reason I was asking about it and I'd actually just be interested in your thoughts on this and then I promise I'll stop asking about it, is it was striking to me to think about you as a 21 year old with long hair, having these, you know, other plans and dreams ahead of yourself, knowing where it actually went. And when I hear your songs--which I do all day, every day--it just sounds so fully formed, you know. It sounds so complete. [Mhmm mhm] And so what feels to me when I listen to your music or when I read what you're writing on the Internet now about this moment we're living in, it's certainty, you know what I mean? It's clarity.
Raffi: Well, Max, thank you. Thank you for that reflection. Um, what's interesting to consider is that, I mean, the folk singer in me and the values, uh, that I, uh, embraced as a 20-something year old, uh, the-they're always alive in me. I mean, one of my heroes back then was Pete Seeger. I used to go see Pete Seeger sing and I'd just be blown away by-by his heart and his character. [Yeah.] Oh, my goodness! So my reason for mentioning Pete is that those who inspire you deeply live in you always. And that's something to consider. You know, it's a beautiful thing. And um [yeah], if Pete were alive today, he'd be making up new songs [laughs] of, uh, every citizen's duty to defend democracy. And when people ask me about my politics, because, you know, I'm pretty vocal on social media, I say, "Hey, hey, I'm just defending democracy. It's every person's duty to fight fascism," is what I say.
Max: Yeah. I saw the other day someone say, "You know, Raffi, can you just stick to the songs, man?" [Raffi laughs] Just-just play the songs.
[MUSIC FADES IN]
Max: Like, if there's a way for me to not get, uh, political with my children's favorite music, that'll be great. And that-and that was your response was like, “all I'm doing is defending democracy.”
Raffi: Mhmm, defending democracy. It takes a village.
[MUSIC FADES OUT]
[[BREAK/MIDROLL]]
[MUSIC FADES IN]
[MUSIC FADES OUT]
Max: It does feel to me, listening to music, talking to you now, like you have found some clarity. You know who you are, and-and I wonder whether there was a moment where that happened for you.
Raffi: You've probably heard the expression of being comfortable in one's own skin.
Max: Sure.
Raffi: Uh, I wasn't always comfortable like that. It was a process that took, uh, decades, actually. And I wasn't always this-this easy and relaxed about being the person that I am, how well known I am and so on. It was a process and in fact, in 2002 I took ten years off the concert stage to develop the child-honoring philosophy. And then in 2012--or 2014 I forget, I think it was 2012--I-I returned to the concert stage. I'd miss singing with my fans [Max laughs] and hearing Baby Beluga [both laugh]. And so it was glorious--well, very sweet homecoming kind of thing for me to be back on stage with fans and--but I continued the child honoring work as I do, you know, every single day of my life. The threat of global warming, the climate emergency we're in now takes up a lot of my time and energy. Um, I've recorded songs and released videos. One song called Cool It, another song called Young People Marching, inspired by Greta Thunberg, the millions of marchers. So, yeah, I just live and-and grow and respond to what the day brings.
Max: What did you miss? What did you miss about your fans? What did you miss about singing Baby Beluga?
Raffi: Just the love and the feeling of, uh, a couple of thousand voices, uh, engaging in a Pete Seeger-esque [laughs] experience [laughs].
Max: Do you feel like a rock star?
Raffi: No, I don't even know what that would feel like. No, not at all.
Max: I think it feels like thousands of people singing along with you.
Raffi: I feel like the guy who goes to the grocery store and comes home with some food and-and cooks it [laughs]. I feel like the guy who calls uh a friend when he's in need. I feel like the person who, uh, still loves to read books and has way too many of them and-and has three or four going all at once and wishes he could just train his mind to just read one book at a time. But no, he just seems to have four or five on the go. [Max laughs] I feel-I feel like that guy, the guy who is, uh, starting his day, uh, with a wood fire and his wood stove insert. So I'm that person, I'm just a real person living my life, going through my days as best I can. I'm 72 years old now, so there's that as well. [laughs] I've never been 72 before. It's a new experience, dammit! [laughs]
Max: Yeah. How's 72 treating you?
Raffi: Ah, mostly well [laughs]. Well, aging, you know, it's not for the faint of heart. It takes courage.
Max: Yeah, but you got courage.
Raffi: Well, I hear Belafonte's 93, so that's interesting [laughs].
Max: You got some times ahead of you, right?
Raffi: Paul McCartney is in his late 70s, right? So he's ahead of me and so those who-who come before us, you know, pave the way, as Pete Seeger did and others, so I just--I just say to myself, "Oh, this is what it feels like to be 72. Alright." And next year I'm going to say "this is what it feels like to be 73. OK, then." [laughs]
Max: Alright.
Raffi: Alright.
Max: But there's nothing, like, surprising, about 72. It's just kind of like, "Huh, 72. Alright."
Raffi: Well, the whole thing's a surprise. And then again, it's not because you know that aging gives you gifts. You know, there's a-an ongoing maturation, you know, a-a maturity that comes to you about the human condition and how you, you know, find your place in it and so on. Something's lost and something's gained in living every day. I've looked a lot from both sides. Oh, I didn't quite sing the melody right the first time, bur that you got the idea that Joni Mitchell song.
Max: Yeah, I did get the idea.
Raffi: Mm hmm. What a brilliant, brilliant expression. “Something's lost and something's gained in living every day.” Let's just say I get it [laughs].
Max: Does that just come naturally or is that-is that a product of work?
Raffi: I think you cultivate a way of being. Especially when you keep in mind what is most important in life. And what our human essence is all about, which is love, of course. These days I've been calling it infinite love, because if you think about it, we are born with it. We are innately filled with infinite love. And then we get to play that love out as we as we grow and as we age. So here I am, you know, at this age, playing with infinite love in every way that I can when I'm interacting with people, whether it's one to one, or to a group. I'm in some sense emanating that feeling of infinite love, which is our...most essential truth. That's who we are. The whole idea is to grow into the person who actively feels that infinite love and can wield it respectfully to both self and others. That's what we're here for.
Max: And is that present for you in every show you do, like every time you sing these songs for the ten millionth time, is that--
Raffi:That's the vibration of love behind the singing in the concerts, yes. That's what I'm hoping to emanate and embody onstage through these songs that we play with [laughs].
Max: Is it always there for you?
Raffi: Always.
Max: Like even-even if you've, um, you know, had a shitty night's sleep and, uh, you've got a bunch of, uh, like errands or your to-do list is really long? Like, you can walk out on stage and summon that every time?
Raffi: Yes.
Max: How?
Raffi: It's my job. That's what I owe the audience and to myself, that's what that hour onstage is all about. Yes.
Max: Does it feel like a job to you?
Raffi: No, it is my job [laughs]. It's my work. It's also--it's also my joy, Max. But it's my job. As a concert performer, that's my job.
Max: Yeah, I mean, I think for some people, um, you know, they would do what they do even if they never made a dollar, you know.
Raffi: Something can be your joy and your life's work at the same time. That's true for me.
Max: That seems kind of like the goal, you know.
Raffi: [laughs] Yeah.
Max: I'm sure you've gotten this question many times, but your most famous songs are your most famous songs. Is there one that is most meaningful to you? Is there one that's closest to your heart?
Raffi: Well, it's probably Baby Beluga, um, which isn't going to surprise a lot of people, but I'll tell you why, because I'm struck by the song's power to reach people after all these years. What is it about this little white whale on the go? Um, is the water warm, is your mama home with you--is that the line? What is it that gets even a six month old? I mean, I have parents who say, you know, the moment we play that song, my child calms down.
Max: Yeah.
Raffi: And I think to myself, “wow, there's a little magic to that song.” You never know when you write a song what's going to happen. You can't know what's going to happen with it. I just delight in that song's power to do some good.
Max: Does it get old for you?
Raffi: No, not at all, actually [laughs]. It just gets more interesting.
Max: Maybe-maybe this is just like I'm just plumbing the depths of my own cynicism here, but I'm going to ask anyway. How does it get more interesting to sing the same song over and over again? How are you not bored of it yet?
Raffi: You don't know the feeling on stage when 2000 people join you. You begin the song and you-you know that they've been waiting for it for two thirds of the concert they've been waiting. And then you launch into it and there's just such a strong feeling of love, joy, delight. And there you are, immersed in it, how beautiful.
Max: And that love you feel when you start Baby Beluga, is that coming to you? Where is that-where's that love going?
Raffi: It's a love that I feel from the first moment that I'm on stage, actually. The way, you know, the audience is in their welcome and so on. And we're playing with these songs. That's what we do when we sing, we're playing with these songs, whether it's a fun song like Banana Phone or a more pensive song. And then Baby Beluga comes and, you know, there's just a huge sort of outpouring of renewed love and some relief that “oh, we're finally get to hear that song” [laughs] You know, it's great fun. And then there's Banana Phone, but [Max laughs] whoa, dude, do we really want to go there?
Max: Oh, I'll talk Banana Phone. Banana Phone is the anthem of my household. [laughs]
Raffi: You will? [laughs] I see. [laughs] This is my banana phone shaker, I got it as a gift. [laughs].
Max: People need to know that-that you just pulled out an actual banana phone.
Raffi: I'll call the White House and have a chat! [both laugh]
Max: Man, it seems like you have such a good time being Raffi.
Raffi: Doesn't it? [laughs]
Max: Yeah.
Raffi: Yeah, baby! [laughs]
Max: What about when you walk off stage? What does that feel like?
Raffi: Oh, just blessed, totally blessed. You know, I've sung in Canada from coast to coast. And then America, all over America, uh, including the L.A. Amphitheater, Broadway in New York. What a lucky guy I am to have had such experiences and just to know that these-these little songs are working their magic and every family that has my music is just amazing. And currently I'm hearing that people, uh, are listening to my songs more than ever. I mean, streaming has allowed a lot of people to have access to music that they might not have been able to afford to purchase in an individual CD form, you know? So it's kind of interesting to see that my fan base can grow even after all these years.
Max: Well, that's a--maybe that's an answer to the other question that I've been thinking about as we got ready to talk, which is on some level, you have continued to age and your audience has sort of stayed the same age.
Raffi: [laughs] Well, kinda. [laughs] [Kinda, right. Kinda] I mean they're aging too but there's new ones that come along. [laughs]
Max: There's new ones coming in. I'm saying like you're reaching people at the same point in their life and then you are continuing to grow. [Hmm.] So help me understand how you maintain that connection.
Raffi: It's quite simple, actually. I mean, uh, the mythical five year old or three year old has the same universal needs of the young child as always. The world around the child may change, but the child's inner needs don't change. So knowing that I play to the child, uh, in the way that I know the child, you know. I know your two year old, even though I haven't met Noah, you know. So, um, it's an honor and a privilege to make music for young families that apparently is heard with great love and reverence and for people to later on in their lives, as adults, to tell me that my music was the soundtrack of their childhoods is one of the greatest honors I could-I could receive from anyone.
Max: Those inner needs. Can you define them?
Raffi: Oh, sure. The need for love, respect--that's the key word actually right there--respect for personhood, nourishment, nurture, shelter, right? These are the irreducible needs of early childhood.
Max: They're core.
Raffi: They're core needs, and they're universal. All children in the world have these needs, regardless of culture, um, skin color, ethnic orient.
Max: Or regardless of the moment we're living in? Do those needs change [no] as the world changes?
Raffi: No, they don't. No, they don't. The circumstances change, but that's why a child honoring is such an interesting philosophy for people to consider, because child honoring works with what we know is true about the human condition. And that's why I call young children the first learners of humanity.
Max: Can we go back to the, um, to the respect for personhood, uh, idea because, when you said that, like, you lit up [Raffi laughs]. What does that mean to you? What does that look like having respect for personhood for a child?
Raffi: The first principle of child honoring is respectful love. The Beatles sang “all you need is love” and that's true. But when I think about respect, love can't be a disrespectful love, because then it's not true love. It can't be a suffocating love or a possessive love. Do you see what I'm saying? Respectful love is about seeing who is there in this person in front of you, seeing that person as a legitimate being, regardless of how young that person is. Seeing the dignity in that young child just for their existence, that they're here, they're reaching out for love and they will lean that way forever. So respect for personhood right from the start is the best we can do to make our societies more peaceful, sustainable, compassionate.
Max: You've talked a lot today about other singer-songwriters, you know, Paul McCartney, Joni Mitchell, Pete Seeger, and when I asked if you feel like a rock star, you said, I just feel like the guy who made a fire this morning. Do you think those people feel like that?
Raffi: I can't speak for them.
Max: But it does seem to me like you feel connected to them.
Raffi: Of course, they live in me, I mean, I sang Beatles songs when I was in my teens. That music lives in me as-as do the composers, you know.
Max: Well, I feel like this question might drive you crazy, but, you know, forgive me, but Paul McCartney is a rock star, you know. Like Paul McCartney can't, uh, can't leave his house without being Paul McCartney.
Raffi: Oh. Oh, I see. Well, I live on an island of 10,000 people. And I'm not as well known as Paul McCartney, but I'm fairly well known and, uh, there's an ease of being here on the west, this west coast island where, you know, I'm out and about and I meet fans in the grocery store, we have laughs [laughs]. We get selfies taken in the grocery store aisles. It's fun.
Max: Yeah.
Raffi: Just fun being who I am and feeling comfortable with it all.
Max: Do you like being well known?
Raffi: It's OK. Um, my face, you know, keeps changing, so the first moment I go out on the concert stage, I'm just greeting my fans and saying a few words, just giving everyone a chance for a moment to [laughs] to say, "oh there-- that's yeah, that's him. But look, he looks different. Uh, yeah ok" you know. [both laugh]
Max: You got-you got to give people a chance to recalibrate?
Raffi: To adjust, yeah [laughs]. Because I don't look like they're videos that were made in the 1980s or in the early 1990s.
Max: At some point you will not be around to play these songs anymore. How do you want people to hear your music after you're gone?
Raffi: With joy and delight and love. It-it is a comfort to know that one's work has longevity.
Max: What's comforting about that?
Raffi: Well, it's a lovely feeling, no? That I have longevity of a career that keeps on happening. My singing voice is still good, I'm very thankful for that. Uh, and to know that-that this music may last a long, long time, decades after I'm gone is an interesting thought [laughs].
Max: But not one you dwell on very much.
Raffi: Not really.
Max: And when you walk off stage and feel blessed, when you leave this music behind and want people to feel that way, how do you make sure the kids hold on to that feeling?
Raffi: Oh, I don't have to do a thing [laughs]. It's all up to them, really. You know, how do we-how do we hold John Denver's songs? How do we hold John Lennon's songs, you know?
Max: We just do.
Raffi: We just do with great love and reverence and yeah, of course, you know, Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald...
[MUSIC FADES IN]
Raffi: I mean, name any singer who’s departed you know, whose music you love, you just keep on loving it.
[MUSIC CONTINUES]
CREDITS
Max: 70 Over 70 is a production of Pineapple Street Studios, and it’s produced by Jess Hackel.
Our associate producer is Janelle Anderson. Our editors are Maddy Sprung-Keyser and Joel Lovell. Research and additional reporting by Charley Locke.
Our mixer is Elliott Adler, and Jenna Weiss-Berman and I are the executive producers.
Our theme song is Like a Dream by Francis and the Lights and the music you’re listening to right now is by Mavis Staples, who just turned 82. Original music by Terence Bernardo. Additional music by Noble Kids, and music licensing by Dan Knishkowy.
Our cover art is by Maira Kalman, who’s 72 and our episode art is by Lynn Staley. She’s 73, and she’s also my mom.
Thank you, Deanna Gobio, and thank you, Raffi.
I'm Max Linsky. Thanks for listening.
[MUSIC FADES OUT]