Helen Adam

PoemTalk Episode #93, Discussing Helen Adam's "Cheerless Junkie's Song", feat. Corina Copp, Laura Sims, and Richard Deming

Listen to the complete recording and read program notes at Jacket2.

"Cheerless Junkie's Song", from Ron Mann's documentary Poetry in Motion, 1981

Complete video (2:47): YouTube

Performing her work, and in conversation with Susan Howe and Charles Ruas, Susan Howe's Pacifica Radio Program, 1977-1978

1. Ballad of the Hawthorn Bower (4:20): MP3
2. Introduction (1:03): MP3
3. On her childhood in Scotland (8:39): MP3
4. On moving to San Francisco, "San Francisco's Burning," and writing ballads aloud (6:28): MP3
5. In and Out of the Horn-Beam Maze (5:38): MP3
6. On her favorite painters (2:17): MP3
7. On Allen Ginsberg, Jack Spicer, Open Space, and the atmosphere of San Francisco (4:11): MP3
8. At the Window (1:12): MP3
9. On gothic romances, magic, and the relationship between love and death (5:44): MP3
10. On Henry VIII's wives and ruthlessness (2:24): MP3
11. The Fair Young Wife (6:08): MP3
12. On madness, the Elizabethan era, and reincarnation (3:02): MP3
13. On Yeats, George MacDonald, and Robert Duncan (6:55): MP3
14. A Walk in the Wind (1:42): MP3

Reading at UCSD with and introduction by Robert Duncan, November 9, 1977

• Complete Recording, (1:02:08)MP3

San Francisco's Burning (1963)

A lyric play written by Helen and Pat Adam, and performed by the Audio-Experimental Theatre on WBAI, July 17, 1977. Produced by Charles Ruas.

Part I

• Section 1 (12:10): MP3
• Section 2 (9:59): MP3
• Section 3 (7:17): MP3
• Section 4 (13:39): MP3
• Section 5 (8:08): MP3
• Section 6 (8:18): MP3
• Section 7 (8:48): MP3

Part II

• Section 1 (9:00): MP3
• Section 2 (8:21): MP3
• Section 3 (11:48): MP3
• Section 4 (6:59): MP3
• Section 5 (7:59): MP3
• Section 6 (9:01): MP3
• Section 7 (8:48): MP3
• Section 8 (9:23): MP3

Part III

• Section 1 (8:26): MP3
• Section 2 (7:42): MP3
• Section 3 (6:27): MP3
• Section 4 (9:12): MP3

Cast

• Helen Adam (reading Miss Mackie Rhodus and Anubis)
• Pat Adam (reading Susan Pettigrew)
• Marilyn Hacker (reading the Countess of Barth Malone)
• Robert Hershon (reading Spangler Jack)
• Barbara Wise (reading the Lovely Mrs. Valentine)
• Also featuring Peter Fleur, William Packard, Martin L.H. Rhymert, Daniel Haberman, William Trapp, Arthur Williams, and Rob Noah Wynne

Adapted for Radio by Helen Adam, with musical assistance by Rob Noah Wynne. Technical direction by Manoli Weatherow and David Rapkin. Produced by Charles Ruas for WBAI.

The complete libretto to San Francisco's Burning was published by Hanging Loose Press in 1985.

Read Kristin Prevallet's Notes on San Francisco's Burning from A Helen Adam Reader (2007)

At Jacket2: Norman MacAffee, "Sixteen Drawings for Helen Adam's San Francisco's Burning"

San Francisco's Burning, With Original Electronic Score by Warner Jepson, 1962

Apapted from the poem and directed for the San Francisco Playhouse stage in 1961 by Kermit Sheets.

Act One

1. Overture, Hangman's House, Barbary Coast (27:08): MP3
2. Mrs. Valentine at work (9:34): MP3
3. The Dowager's mansion, Nob Hill (21:15): MP3
4. Russian Hill, Barty meets Laura who meets Spangler (8:28): MP3
5. Hangman's House, end of Act 1 (10:11): MP3

Act Two

1. Dowager's house (13:53): MP3
2. Between two worlds, Susan, Sailor, and Neal (9:22): MP3
3. Hangman's House and Golden Gate Park (23:05): MP3
4. Nob Hill, wedding, GGPark duel, Earthquake (13:40): MP3

See photographs, clippings, and other ephemera from the production on Warner Jepson's PennSound author page

Helen Adam on PennSound Daily

• August 5, 2009: "A Helen Adam Sampler"
• November 3, 2007: "Helen Adam's San Francisco's Burning"

© 2007 by Helen and Pat Adam. These sound recordings are being made available for noncommercial and educational use only. All rights to this recorded material belong to the authors. Used with permission of the authors. Distributed by PennSound.