Busy Being Free: A Lifelong Romantic is Seduced by Solitude

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Mitchell has long resisted naming any of the people in this or any of her songs, saying it's best to keep them anonymous because people are free to imagine themselves as the characters in the songs when they don't know what she had in mind. Having said that, there were parts of the book that I really enjoyed and that also made me reflect on my own experiences in a new light. She redeemed herself for the fact I had to keep looking up words. Barbara Fasano sings with such deeply felt belief in her material that the art she practices is closer to pure expression than interpretation. Her take on 'Photographs,' in which she brings at least three levels to the song at the same time, is worth the price of the CD."— David Hajdu, music critic for The Nation

Busy Being Free: A Lifelong Romantic is Seduced by Solitude

Some things she wrote beautifully about : how we can think our life is going one way and ends up going some where different and how the place you grow up is the source of all shame. Busy Being Free is a perfect combination of sharp, moving and funny. A story about marriage and its life beyond divorce, but also about how we define ourselves through our relationships and the physical and emotional transformation that comes with maturity and middle age. This is a brave book as it explores love, lust and female desire to the bone, but does it with such airy effortlessness that it becomes a gift we can all learn from -- Lily Dunn, author of Sins of My FatherI took comfort in many of the things she revealed she processed post divorce and her exploration of shame and disappointment. Karma from NyShe's singing about being free and the guys who want her to settle down with them. She thinks she might love them all but she doesn't want to settle down. She doesn't want to hurt them but hey, would you settle down if you looked like Joni, had her intelligence and talent and was just getting started? I know I wouldn't. But yeah, it must have hurt to have so many wanting a committment from her; kinda selfish on their part in my humble opinion. Nonetheless, I think it made her feel bad...guilty...that they were hurt. She still wanted to see them but she didn't want to see one of them only and be tied down. Good for her. Saint Tropez from ShanghaiThere is a palpable tension between love and freedom in the cactus tree. The "love concept" of the 70's play a crucial role in how Joni wrote the lyrics through the eyes of her youth. Freedom was in that period was an ultimate break-off from all 9-5 job, wealth acquisitions, societal behaviors, love of country traditions and conventions. I am surprised that a "man of faith" is not included in one verse cause that would have sum-up the "system". The woman is frankly searching for True love in others and herself. In the late 60's and early 70's the Answer to genuine/true and lasting love came in the form of the Jesus' movement. Conversely, I have seen and met many women in their 40's living up to their freedom in their youth and ending up desperately lonely and looking for True love to fill their empty hearts. The paradox is that True love is ultimately bonding but set us free. We can only assume that the woman found it otherwise the song doesn't offer any solution to her emptiness and search for love and freedom.

Busy Being Free: A Lifelong Romantic is Seduced by Solitude Busy Being Free: A Lifelong Romantic is Seduced by Solitude

A look at what it is to be a woman, and what it is to define oneself outside of the framework so often ascribed to women – Busy Being Free is an absorbing account of being alone, and one you’ll want to read in a single, insatiable, sitting. Busy Being Free Summary By shrouding all of these areas of my life in the nature of being productive, I am making them more valuable,” he concluded. “There are tangible results, both personally and professionally, associated with them. By looking at my work and my time through this lens, it makes them all more rewarding.” At times I laughed out loud but I also nearly gave up on the book two or three times because the name dropping and superfluous vocabulary became irritating.I’m Lucy, an award-winning book blogger, bibliotherapist and writer with a passion for brilliant books, independent bookstores, literary travel and book festivals around the world. The Literary Edit is your guide to the beautiful world of books.

Barbara Fasano - BIO

We met a variety of men during Busy Being Free – including both her worst sexual experiences, and then, later, some of her best – and despite their frequent appearance, Emma does a wonderful job of making the memoir about so much more than men. So many of you have been so generous during these past 2 years. As we re-emerge from this COVID crisis, it's still tough days for all of us ... including performers. If you'd like to buy us a drink at the bar, GO HERE. photo: Jeff Fasano Seductive and sexy easy-read, also warming and re-affirming - there is romance in solitude. Life lesson that it’s better to be comfortable and alone rather than uncomfortable with another. To describe a memoir as solipsistic may seem redundant, but Busy Being Free is solipsistic in the best way: that is to say, Forrest is hyper-aware that she is telling her own story. She does not attempt to extrapolate universal meanings or turn her hard-won insights into lessons for other women in similar situations, as many such books often do. “Getting to middle age has been a process of learning, knowing, believing,” she writes. “Now what? Having finished that painstaking excavation, what do you use the next half of your life for?” As well as being elegantly written, Busy Being Free is eminently readable - a treasure trove of profound insights into love, lust and female desire. -- Emma Lee Potter * DAILY MIRROR *

Barbara Fasano is not just a singer, she is a persuasive storyteller. In her warm alto, supported by John di Martino's blissful arrangements and a swinging band, she is committed to telling these stories ... an exceptional ballad singer who can also swing. And sing she does. Borrowing from the tapestry of her life, she imbues truth in her delivery at every turn." ~ John Hoglund, Cabaret Scenes Barbara’s many New York headline engagement include concert appearances at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center’s American Songbook at the Appel Room, Rose Hall, Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola, New York Festival of Song, Town Hall and New York’s 92nd Street Y’s Lyrics and Lyricists series. Starring engagements in cabaret and nightclubs include Birdland, Jazz at Kitano, The Algonquin, Feinstein’s, The Carlyle, Iridium, 54 Below, Café Sabarsky, the Palace in Stamford, CT, Night Town in Cleveland, Live at Zedel and Pizza Express Live in London and the Royal Room at the Colony Hotel in Palm Beach. Arts centers and music festivals across the country include Saratoga Jazz Festival, Music Mountain Festival's Twilight Jazz, Kravis Center, Caramoor, Arizona Jazz Festival, Jersey Jazz, Kanbar Center, Cooperstown Music Festival, Provincetown Cabaret Festival, Sheldon Concert Hall and Jazz at The Bistro in St. Louis, Night Town in Cleveland, Prince Music Theatre, and Kerrytown Concert House. On September 29, 2019, David Crosby said he was the man in the first verse. He had long been the prime suspect. This book is billed as a story of female emancipation, albeit a very straight, white, middle-class one. But for all Forrest’s clichéd yet still enjoyable wisdom – “So many of us think our life is going to go one way and it ends up going somewhere completely different”, she writes in the first chapter – I could not get past the book’s frequent moments of real ghastliness. Solitude is not a bad thing - it forces introspection and reflection, and gives the opportunity for one to find what they really want (need?)

Busy Being Free by Emma Forrest review - The Guardian

Dance-in-the-living-room romantic... She can sigh a song without making it flimsy, declare sentiment without weighing it down. Jaunty numbers like her now-familiar jazz rendition of 'The Surrey With The Fringe On Top' (performed with a smile in the vocal) are also included. 'Hurry On Down' adds Warren Vache's cheeky cornet to superb effect." ~ Alix Cohen, Broadway World

In any case, there are few singer/songwriters that come close to Joni. There are some fine lyricists, but they can't express their emotions and feelings in their voices as Joni could. There are some excellent voices but their lyrics are bland or trite or so terribly obscure that they aren't worth the effort. Barbara Fasano is the real deal! A natural romantic interpreter... The beauty of the Arlen songs and the breathlessness of Fasano’s beautiful singing comes fully through. Each musical genre has examples of albums that demand repeated listening and appreciation... this is one of them!"