Boston Meetings & Seminars - Brief Visits for Business and Pleasure

2023-07-12, By Gary Kennedy, P. Eng., PMP

Boston Meetings & Seminars - Brief Visits for Business and Pleasure: Shaking off the Covid Years with Business Optimism. I'm glad to be heading to Boston for a few meetings and to connect with a collection of Project Management Institute (PMI) friends at a seminar. It's a great city that will likely feel familiar to most Newfoundlanders and Labradorians. There are hundreds of years of seafaring connections between Boston and NL. I apparently have distant ancestors who sailed the schooner trades between Boston and St. John's. (On the Morgan side of my family, not the Kennedy side, LOL). This will be my 4th visit to Boston, and hopefully there will be many more. On my first trip in 2004 I attended the Northeast Natural Gas Symposium. It included a diverse array of topics, including energy economics, geopolitical factors, markets, pipelines, feasibilities of methodologies like LNG and CNG (analyzed back in 2004) for marine transportation, storage, access to stranded gas & associated gas, and other important issues. During this 2004 Boston visit I stayed longer through the weekend to tour the great historic downtown area. In addition, I'm an amateur drummer with a kit in my basement since 1974, so I wandered into the campus of the world class Berklee College of Music. I intended just to have a visual walk-through; however, I was happily approached and overwhelmed with kindness from Prof. Yoron Israel, who is now the Head of Percussion for Berklee College. He is amazing, and we still keep in touch.

MORAL: Try to enjoy your business trips and benefit from the "food for the soul". Bring drumsticks, snorkels, guitar picks, or fishing poles with you.

** If you are interested in Berklee College, jazz, and other Boston features, then please keep reading below. Cheers!

My second journey to Boston was in 2019 after spending a long period working away from my family at a mining location. It was time for the operation's annual Christmas break. Our oldest son is a Bruins fan, so we booked a few days in Boston to catch a great game. We also dropped into a first-class Jazz Concert at Berklee College of Music. The music was provided by the incredible Laszlo Gardony Trio , with Prof Yoron Israel on drums. It was quite a privilege, and great to reunite with Yoron! The third Boston excursion was thanks to a lucky break in 2022. I won my workplace Christmas Raffle for Air Miles, and we selected Boston for our destination. Julie and I happily enjoyed touring Boston, and we met more Berklee percussion professors on campus. Thanks to the hospitality of Prof. Sergio Bellotti, we were able to meet him at a very cool Jazz Jam. LOL, as mentioned below, my wife recorded a few videos where I borrowed Prof. Sergio's drums for some jazz grooves at "Slade's Bar and Grill" in downtown Boston.

I also had a great hour-long visit with another extraordinary percussion educator and performer, Prof. Skip Hadden. He invited me to sit through one of his Berklee drum classes, and we reviewed the jazz style of of the late, great Chick Webb. What a lucky honour for a basement drummer like me, thanks to Skip's Boston hospitality.

In addition to all of the above Berklee/Boston connections, I met another elite Berklee Percussion Professor who happened to travel to Newfoundland and Labrador in early 2023.  Prof. Ian Froman arrived here for a Jazz Clinic at MUN School of Music, and a Jazz Concert at the St. John's Arts & Culture Centre. He said he's made frequent trips to St. John's to perform with jazz friends, and has enjoyed our best Fish & Chips in classic places such as The Duke of Duckworth, LOL.

The above photo is a sample of the Berklee Drummers that I've been lucky to meet (for at least an autograph, LOL) at various times. Clockwise from top right: Prof. Skip Hadden; Steve Smith (of 'Journey' and 'Vital Information' fame, plus a Berklee Grad, in St. John's for a drum clinic); Prof. Yoron Israel; Prof. Sergio Bellotti, and Prof. Ian Froman.

Upcoming is my 4th trip to Boston, as mentioned above, and it will involve providing training for Beta-test rollouts for "Built Environment (Construction) Project Management" courses for the PMI (Project Management Institute). I may not have time for music performances/classes this time, but Julie and I will return to "Cheers" Restaurant (near Boston Common) for the famous clam "chowda", to "Emmet's Pub & Restaurant" for great Irish fare, and we will pursue more culture, art, and other enjoyment while "Taking Care of Business" (ref BTO, lol).

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Boston Jazz Drums Video:

I've captured some of my downtown Boston jazz drumming on video. It's only a pastime for a few laughs and relaxation. If you're curious about viewing the vids, please contact me at gkennedy@LPSglobal.ca , and I'll send you the YouTube links.

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