Her book Sun Cheese (named after a solar-powered product made on her regenerative holisticly managed farm) discusses how megafauna maintained climate and extremely abundant ecosystems before being driven to extinction by humans as they moved onto each continent, and how we can mimic those systems or support those who are to create a desireable future. Full of results of research and personal experience creating such systems/ I interviewed her in late July 2026: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1het5wUo0oUNbAVSGgerHbZu6anRZ0WRX/view?usp=sharing
The Thistles plus 1 in Concert – Sunday October 4, 3-5 PM
Sandisfield Arts Center, 5 Hammertown Rd., Sandisfield, MA
Terry Keevil, oboe and duduk (Armenian oboe); Gerold Mohn, Clarinet; Lesley Rosenthal, electric violin; Jaye Alison Moscariello, vocals; Bill Taylor, Piano. Music composed by Bill Taylor, Paul McCandless, and others. Bill writes contemporary classical, influenced by jazz and show tunes, inspired by nature, love, outer space, and current goings on. Tickets at the door (opens 2:30 PM) or visit https://sandisfieldartscenter.org.
Their sound blends classical, jazz and show tune influences in a unique and often unexpected way that is inspiring and a joy to hear. In addition to many of Bill Taylor’s works, they play works by Ralph Towner, Laura Nyro, Terry Keevil, and other composers and songwriters.
While the musicians have each performed for decades, this ensemble got together in 2024 and Rosenthal joined in 2025. Taylor’s music is inspired by classical greats like Schumann, Debussy and the “3 B’s”, and by his exposure to jazz, show tunes, and other music of our times. Keevil has several albums including one for the Duduk (Armenian oboe) which appears in Thistles concerts. Mohn plays in the Stockbridge Sinfonia and is principal clarinet with the Holyoke Symphony. Rosenthal is a poet as well as musician, and directs The Julliard School. Moscariello is also a visual artist. Our name comes from the energizing, liver-supporting thistle drink Jaye makes and which some of us drink before performances and at other times. With thistle, lemon and apple, it alkalinizes the body.
This gathering of talent brings together decades of professional excellence. Terry Keevil brings thirty years with North Shore Pro Musica and the Manhattan Chamber Orchestra. Gerold Mohn serves as principal clarinetist for the Holyoke Symphony. Jaye Alison’s vocals have been featured in Bill’s concerts for over a decade and she is a celebrated visual artist. Lesley Rosenthal, a Juilliard executive and founder of the rescue effort for the Afghanistan National Institute of Music, delivers powerful electric violin performances. Bill Taylor, a local farmer and radio host, anchors the group with his unique, nature-inspired compositions.
Terry Keevil (oboe, duduk) has been a member of the Manhattan Chamber Orchestra and Choir of Sacred Music, and performed with Lazar Gosman’s Tchaikovsky Orchestra as well as the Bach Aria Group. For over thirty years he was a member of the chamber group, North Shore Pro Musica. Terry was also part of the Constellation Trio with Linda Wetherill, flute and Steve Salerno, guitar. Terry has performed and recorded with cellist David Darling and released a CD of original duduk music titled “Duduk Creations”. He received a DMA in oboe performance from SUNY/Stony Brook where he studied with Steve Taylor, and an MM from SUNYSB where he studied with Ronald Roseman. As an undergraduate, he attended Amherst College for two years and received a BA from Sarah Lawrence College, where he studied with Ronald Roseman. Terry and his wife, Sarah, moved to West Stockbridge from Long Island in the Summer of 2023. Terry performs regularly in a variety of ensembles and solo appearances.
Gerold Mohn (clarinet) grew up in Leverkusen, Germany and recently retired from a career as a scientist in Biopharmaceutical Research and Development. He moved to North Carolina in 1995 as part of an international assignment for a large pharmaceutical company. Gerold developed his passion for music when he received his first clarinet at the age of 10 and was introduced to his teacher Hans Kämmerling who also taught him piano and later became a lifelong friend, mentor and chamber music partner.
Throughout his professional life, Gerold continued to study clarinet and bassoon and performed with the Sinfonieorchester Bergisch Gladbach, Germany, the North Carolina Wind Orchestra, the Raleigh Civic Symphony and Chamber Orchestra and was a founding member of the Triangle Wind Ensemble. Gerold and his wife Cathy moved to West Stockbridge in 2017. Currently he serves as principal clarinetist of the Holyoke Symphony and performs regularly the Stockbridge Sinfonia, the Eagles Community Band and the Berkshire Winds.
Jaye Alison Moscariello (vocals) is a visual artist and singer who recorded on both of Bill’s albums, trained with Rosa D’Acri and performed at Durham (CT) Grange and with Anderson Valley Chorus, led Laura Nyro tributes, and numerous concerts with Bill. She has been a professional painter in a variety of media since 1973, shows internationally as well as locally, directed several short films including From the Ashes about fire recovery in California. She’s a volunteer on the Gallery committee of the Sandisfield Arts Center (organizer of their International Film Festival and Art Show) and New Marlborough Meeting House Gallery.
Lesley Rosenthal plays in several groups and is an accomplished electric violinist based in New York and Otis MA. She is Chief Operating Officer and Corporate Secretary of The Juilliard School. Previously she served as EVP, General Counsel & Secretary of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York. Rosenthal graduated from Harvard College and Harvard Law School, served a six-year term on the Harvard University Board of Overseers and chaired its Arts & Humanities committee. She is the author of the bestselling book, Good Counsel: Meeting the Legal Needs of Nonprofits (John Wiley & Sons 2012) and co-librettist of the jazz opera, Dear Erich. As immediate past President of the NY Bar Foundation, she led the organization through a 3-year strategic plan period with the Rule of Law as its central theme. Together with the Nigerian actress Omotola Jalade Ekeinde, she co-presented a panel on arts and the rule of law at the 2017 World Justice Forum. Rosenthal is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the founding board chair of Friends of the Afghanistan National Institute of Music, which in 2021 galvanized international support for the rescue of all 273 members of the Afghan music school from peril at the hands of the Taliban.
Bill Taylor (Piano) is a composer, pianist, and market gardener/farmer and radio show cohost with Jaye, living in Sandisfield MA. Members of the Ukiah Symphony, with Bill on piano, performed several of his works in March 2019. He played in the Soul Purpose Band from 2012 to 2020, was church pianist and organist from 2004 to 2020 in northern California and from 2022 to present in West Stockbridge, MA. While in California he performed and recorded with wind player Paul McCandless and jazz flautist George Husaruk. His farming and environmental awareness and involvement inform his compositions. He studied composition at Cornish School and with composer Ken Benshoof, piano with his father Arnold Taylor, Harriet Shirvan in Boston, and jazz pianist Jerry Gray in Seattle. His music was featured in several films produced by Jaye Alison Moscariello. In June 2023 and again in 2024 he was a composer at the Mostly Modern Festival (MMF) where his chamber pieces Regenerate, Heal, Cool, Normalizing Evil and others were performed. He attended the Screen Music Program in Pavia, Italy in August 2025, an introduction to writing for film and video games.
Several hundred acres in SW Vermont and adjacent New York State are being managed by Russell Wallack and others at Breadtree farms. As their name suggests, chestnut flour is a versatile gluten-free product that can be grown in the Northeastern US as it has been historically in temperate regions around the world. He is planting blight-resistant hybrids, along with hickory (for oil) and seaberry. The show was recorded in June 2025. The interview begins around 6 minutes in and ends 50 minutes in. After the interview are updates on biodiverse gardening, using multiple harvests from each bed that include wild plants.
Megafauna until ten thousand years ago maintained soil health and the water cycle by trampling and feeding savannas. Since humans drove these to extinction on most continents, it is up to graziers with large animals (cattle, sheep, etc.) to mimic this effect by moving the animals frequently as predators would have done, so they get the freshest grazing and do not overgraze. Animals can actually restore water cycles and sequester carbon and be a climate solution rather than a problem – if they are grazed properly, Siobhan Griffin once lived in the Northeastern US and now lives in New Zealand and helps ranchers all over the world to do it right. Show recorded in April 2025.
We interviewed West Stockbridge, Pittsfield, and Sheffield market managers. The Pittsfield interview discussed the Roots Rising program which empowers youth to work on farms as well as run the market.
The album “Of These Times” is out! It is on Bandcamp as digital download and will be on other platforms when CD Baby finishes inspecting it. Let your friends know about the listening party too! Note you can come online as early as 6:30 PM. You can order the physical copy with 8 panels of information and amazing art by Jaye Alison Moscariello! Order directly from me for $20 plus $5 shipping. You get 75 minutes of great music on 14 tracks, inspired by a space mission, political chaos, the natural world, varied musical traditions, regenerative farming, fire, and a peaceful conclusion. Send email to edibleland9@gmail.com with your mailing address and I will email you my paypal link.
Jaye and I discuss growing native plants and restoring the strained ecosystem in the Berkshire-Taconic region using ecologically sound methods of propagation such as using their community of plants to select the best genetics, organic methods in soil mixes, etc. Helia Native Nursery continues her 20 years of experience and provides plants and expertise to landscape design clients and the public. We also touch on using invasive plants instead of overharvesting medicinal native plants with similar properties.
Jaye and I had a stimultating discussion with farmer Ted Dobson, founder of the first Western Massachusetts organic farm, Equinox Farm. Broadcasted Feb. 17, 2025 at berkshireradio.org, WBCR-LP 97.7 FM Great Barrington MA. Here is a link:
Above right here is the latest Farm and Garden Show which will broadcast on berkshireradio.org this Monday January 27 from 10-11 AM eastern time, and a few more Mondays in the coming weeks (you can also listen to the archive there anytime within 2 weeks after each broadcast). Dr. Don Huber speaks about glyphosate and the many detrimental effects it has on our and the soil microbiome, chronic diseases, autism, cancer, creating nutrient deficiencies as it is a mineral chelator, antibiotic, and broad spectrum herbicide all in one. Contrary to industry spin, it is not a safe chemical.
