A unique fusion of narrative and music.

I’ve created performance pieces out of my memoirs, reading the stories aloud and illustrating them not with pictures, but with songs.

The songs are covers, often well-known, but heard in a new way. The story gives them a new context.

I’ve sung everything from American standards to contemporary pop music, accompanied by electric guitar played by my longtime collaborator, Jeff Allyn Szwast. The arrangements are stripped down and spare. They feel like an extension of the text, not something with a life apart from it.

Jeff Allyn Szwast.

"The music, by Master Michael Quinn and Jeff Allyn Szwast, was the perfect mix of moody and sultry–if you ever get a chance to see this duo perform, seize it with both hands. They will simultaneously break your heart and make you feel redeemed."

-Jenny Williamson, poet & author of Collections of Flaws in a Black Dress

Bedridden*

Published in the 92Y Unterberg Poetry Center’s literary magazine Podium*.

Blue Illusion

Boo*

*A version of this essay was a finalist for the 2021 Brooklyn Film & Arts Festival Nonfiction Prize.

Kiss & Tell

Last Call

My Valentine*

*Performed by The Valentines: Dave Hall, Jen Ng, Michael Quinn, & Jeff Allyn Szwast

link to dixon place.jpg — “My Valentine”

at Dixon Place (August, 2016)

link to youtube [credit photo by Diane Rodriguez].JPG — Two covers performed by The Valentines

at the Mindy Ross Gallery (October, 2017)

Venues: Bullet Space, Carnegie Hall, Dixon Place, Don’t Tell Mama’s, Eleven Brooklyn, Hell Phone Speakeasy, The Hideaway Salon, The Historical Society of Woodstock, The Mindy Ross Gallery, St. Peter’s Chelsea, Speyer Hall, The Wythe Hotel

Dancing with Bollywood Axion for a live, televised performance of Aventura’s “Por Un Segundo” (Premio Lo Nuestro, 2010)