Embarrassed
As a music fan, I'm continually embarrassed with every article Rich Albertoni writes. In his April 6 music column ("Piano Man"), he not only missed an opportunity to write about a local band receiving national exposure (Knuckel Drager on tour with Exene Cervenka and The Original Sinners), he didn't bother to research the fact that three members of the band are now in her backing band.
He instead delivers a reworded, out-of-date press release about a Holiday Inn piano player. I figured he might be nervous about ruffling feathers after managing to shut down a popular local punk club, but this is ridiculous. And just lazy.
If you're interested in fluffy personality profiles, fine, stick with those. But if you're going to cover a music scene you'll need to do more than catch the occasional show and get all your info from Myspace profiles.
Dave Zero
Rich Albertoni replies: I take issue with Dave Zero's flippant use of the term "Holiday Inn piano player" to belittle the long and accomplished career of David Bicknase. Bicknase is a one-of-a-kind showman who has recorded 12 original albums over 25 years. He's not worthy of a story?
Letter of recommendation
As a supervisor at the University of Wisconsin Survey Center, I read with concern your "A Classic Case of Bullying" Watchdog column (3/30/07), which characterized my workplace as fostering bullying and unfair treatment of employees. I have worked at the UWSC for four years, and my experiences could not be more different. The UWSC has been a great place to work, the best of my professional life.
The organization is committed to excellence in survey research, and the staff is remarkably dedicated to this principle in all that they do. In my experience, the management rewards hard work and good ideas, and it handles mistakes with constructive criticism and feedback.
Ken Croes
