About Dave Conlin Read

Covering the arts and entertainment scene in the Berkshires since the late ’90s, newberkshire.com is published by Dave Conlin Read, a native of Oswego, NY who moved to the Berkshires in 1981 to take a position teaching English at a residential school for emotionally-disturbed adolescents. He segued into working with adult consumers of mental health services in 1990 and was ready for services himself when the Internet came along mid-decade.

Read’s pre-Internet journalism credentials include stints writing sports for the Oswego Palladium-Times, a year as poetry editor of the Pendulum literary magazine (SUNY Oswego), sports director and talk-show host on WTTC-FM (Springfield, MA), freelance articles and essays in Springfield Union-News and Berkshire Eagle, weekly music column in the Berkshire Record.

On the Internet, Read's 1998 article about Bob Dylan and the Rolling Thunder Revue was excerpted in the October 2000 "Q Dylan - Maximum Bob!," deemed an invaluable resource by Dylanologists. In 2002, Read had press credentials for Dylan's ballyhooed return to the Newport Folk Festival.  Just 3 weeks earlier, he covered Seiji Ozawa's Tanglewood farewell.

Another highlight was being invited to report on the rehearsal of the June 30, 2001 Tanglewood performance of A Prairie Home Companion© with Garrison Keillor.