furtive_vole

Four years later - I've just come across this thread when searching for something else. I met Mike Mandel a couple of times, in London & New York, around 1978/79 in connection with Players Association. As I recall, he had grown up in an impoverished rural community in somewhere like Georgia. He developed glaucoma at the age of 8 which went undiagnosed or untreated, and as an adult had some recollection of a sighted childhood. At Blind School the kids were taught very few skills to support independent living - not even using a white cane! The only options were basket making or piano tuning - he chose the latter. I'm afraid I now forget the details of how he got into jazz funk & electronics. Mike lived in an apartment block in Manhatten. He had total confidence about walking out into the street to the local stores - without cane or guide dog - without being run down or ripped off. An example to us all. Does anyone know what he went on to do?