Peoria best city in Illinois, 35th top city in U.S. well-being ranking

Peoria ranks at the top in Illinois and 35th in the country in the annual measure of well-being compiled by Gallup-Healthways, aimed at civic leaders in the nation's largest 189 cities.

Peoria's ranking in the 2013 State of American Well-Being Index released this week shows the community, for the most part, is thriving in terms of being productive, performance and cost and that its residents surveyed for the report are satisfied with their lives.

Peoria ranked No. 62 in the 2012 Well-Being Index, which was the most recent reported.

The report notes that cities with higher-ranked states of well-being didn't achieve that status by accident, but by cultivating and embracing a culture of well-being, with leaders of business, government, education, healthcare, faith and the arts acting on the philosophy that improving well-being for its people is "how we do things here."

For business and civic leaders, the high ranking is something to hang their hats on but it also shows there is still work to be done to continually improve the community's well-being, according to the leadership of Gallup and Healthways.

"High well-being means healthier populations, more productive and profitable businesses and more economically vibrant communities," said the CEOs of the two companies, Ben R. Leedle Jr. of Healthways and Jim Clifton of Gallup, in a letter in the report.

The report, which can be viewed www.well-beingindex.com., is the sixth annual report that the companies who collaborate on it have prepared in their effort to "create a new normal ̶ one with well-being at its core." More than 2 million interviews have been done through the six years to measure well-being, which "provides the dual benefits of educating individuals on what well-being is and giving leaders insights into what interventions to take at the population levels," said the report.

"Well-being is your business. Chronic disease and obesity are on the rise, healthcare costs continue to be the No. 1 expense item for many businesses, and workers tell us that relationships in the workplace have declined significantly over the past six years. It's time for leaders at all levels in all sectors to take notice," Leedle and Clifton wrote.

"Well-being is our business. For more than 50 years, Gallup and Healthways, in partnership with leading economists, psychologists, and other scientists have been exploring the dimensions of a life well-lived. We understand what differentiates a thriving life from one spent suffering — and the impact of well-being on measurable business value," they added.

The survey measures:

• · Life evaluation
• · Work environment
• · Emotional health
• · Basic access
• · Physical health
• · Healthy behavior

Those factors all combine to make up a person's well-being more so than measuring factors that we most often hear about, the report said. "Measures such as unemployment, GDP, and health statistics are essential, but less than adequate in optimizing change. They reflect the past. People make decisions based on what they directly experience. Leaders need to know what their constituents are experiencing today so that they have a better understanding of how today's decisions will impact the future."

Noting the composite index of the surveys decreased in 2013, from a score of 66.7 in 2012 to 66.2, the report said the decline resulted from lower scores in physical health, healthy behavior and life evaluation. The report further noted that the three most dominant trends in the six years of the Well-Being report has been a continuing decrease in the number of people with health insurance, an increase in obesity across the country and declining scores in work environment.

"Well-being is more important than ever to our nation, be it for the sake of rising healthcare costs, the health and vitality of our citizens, or the productivity and performance of our workers. Our measurement confirms some languishing national trends but also provides a roadmap to improve well-being, which can be accomplished through a determined, shared commitment by policy-makers, business leaders, and individuals," the report said.

The top 10 metropolitan areas for well-being in 2013 were:

1. · San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA
2. · San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA
3. · Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV
4. · Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, MN-WI
5. · Denver-Aurora, CO
6. · Raleigh-Cary, NC
7. · Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, MA-NH
8. · Austin-Round Rock, TX
9. · Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA
10. · San Diego-Carlsbad-San Marcos, CA

Other Illinois cities in the rankings were Chicago, which came in at No. 67, and Rockford, which was ranked No. 176.

Illinois ranked 22nd among the 50 states, an improvement from 2012's ranking of No. 28, the report showed. North and South Dakota ranked nos. 1 and 2, respectively, in the 2013 report.

The report also ranked well-being by Congressional District. The two districts serving Peoria, the 17th District represented by Aaron Schock, R-Peoria, and the 18th District represented by Cheri Bustos, D-East Moline, were ranked No. 229 and No. 119, respectively, among the 417 Congressional districts.

Frizzi: An American music lesson

A few nights ago, Heddy (wife) and I got to see Crosby Stills and Nash in concert at Peoria's Civic Theater. They were in good voice and played almost four hours. Newer songs mixed well with the old classics. We were smiling, happy, heading out the door when I heard somebody say:

"I sure wish Neil Young was with them!"

We're told we're not supposed to have regrets in life. No Regrets! You see it on tattoos and in commercials for cell phones, power drinks and extreme body sprays.

But I do have a regret. Just one. I turned down a free ticket to see Neil Young in concert.

It gets worse.

Neil Young is a classic rocker. In 1966, he and Stephen Stills formed the band, Buffalo Springfield. Three years later, Young joined Stills' new group that was formed with Graham Nash of The Hollies and Crosby's band with Roger McGuinn, The Byrds. Young also recorded with the band, Crazy Horse, which included the hits "Cinnamon Girl" and "Down By The River." With CSN&Y, Young wrote and performed the controversial anti-war song, "Ohio."

In the fall of 1985 I was living in Terre Haute, Ind. I had graduated from Indiana State University right at the time the recession hit. I was lucky to be working full-time with benefits. I worked with a guy called "TMcD." He was a good natured guy, thin, wore a mullet, loved to play basketball like most Hoosiers and had pretty good taste in music. His favorite music was country.

The fall of 1985 in Terre Haute was like living in 1976, when music went south along with culture and good taste. The fashion was to dress like either cowboys or lumberjacks. In central Indiana, there were very few real cowboys and lumberjacks. I went through my cowboy phase when I was 5, with a cap gun and rocking horse. I wasn't a good old boy. I didn't wave the "stars and bars." I did not want to listen to their music.

No Waylon. No Willie. No Charlie Daniels. No Conway Twitty, No Tammy Wynette, No Crystal Gayle, No Mandrell Sisters. No .38 Special. No Lynyrd Skynyrd. No Alabama. No outlaw rock. No country radio. No truck drivin' CB Radio big rig tunes. I'd have none of it. The music made my brown eyes bleed.

To me, good music died in 1975. Even the great ones fell. The Rolling Stones music had a disco beat Mick could dance to with Bowie. Paul McCartney was playing silly love songs. Elton John and Eric Clapton had fallen into light rock limbo. Peter Gabriel left Genesis. The soul music of Mavis Staples became the disco music of Donna Summer.

Music at that time was as ugly as the polyester leisure suit, the orange recliner and the Ford Pinto. I thought Foreigner and Journey sounded like the same band. I wasn't a bang-your-head metal boy although I did listen to Scorpion and Motorhead. And I had enough of that funky stuff.

So, when my friends and I got together, TMcD included, out came the standards like Led Zeppelin, Grateful Dead, Pink Floyd and Bob Seger. Sometimes, we'd even diversify. Someone would bring over Spirit or Ten Years After. Someone else would play Gentle Giant or Yes. Another would bring over Peter Tosh or Black Uhuru, if we were in a reggae mood.

Oddly enough, nobody in Terre Haute liked Bruce Springsteen then. This was before he "played to the masses" with his 1984 album, "Born In The USA." I even had a college pal whose roommate was from New Jersey. He said, and I quote, "They don't even like Springsteen in Jersey."

My hand to the heavens, he said that. If Chris Christie heard that, he wouldn't be allowed over the bridge!

Everyone had their sub genres. I liked punk rock. TMcD loved classic country music and country rock and he would try to get me to listen to it.

"Just get past the twang and really listen to the music" he'd say. "Listen to the words!"

I tried. But when I did I'd see nothing but hillbillies, clodhoppers and rednecks. I'd have visions of "Smokey and the Bandit," "Urban Cowboy" and "The Dukes of Hazard" dancing in my brain. I simply couldn't separate the wheat from the chaff.

Maybe it was because of country overload. It was everywhere. The fad took over radio, TV and movies. There were too many good ol' boys with their women wearing straw cowboy hats with pink feathers riding around in pick-up trucks.

It was like the bar scene in The Blues Brothers, where the joint had "both kinds of music, country AND western!"

There was a time I did like some cowboy music. When I was a kid, I liked Gene Autry. I watched The Porter Waggoner Show. Porter would come out and sing, his jacket festooned with sequined wagon wheels. Dolly Parton launched her career on the show. You couldn't not like Dolly! And there was this great silly cornpone comedian named Speck Rhodes.

I got my first taste of Hank Williams from the 1964 movie "Your Cheatin' Heart." It starred a pre-tanned George Hamilton lip-syncing to Hank's songs, which were sung by son Hank Williams, Jr.

I was glued to The Johnny Cash Show, which had Bob Dylan and Pete Seeger as guests. I loved Pete Drake's steel guitar that Dylan used on "Lay Lady Lay" and "Tonight, I'll Be Staying Here With You." Both songs were on Dylan's album "Nashville Skyline," which featured Johnny Cash with Charlie Daniels on bass.

I'd watch "Hee Haw" to see Roy Clark play guitar. Buck Owens sang his signature song "Act Naturally," which The Beatles covered. And there was only one Minnie Pearl. For that matter, there was only one Junior Samples!

There was The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour where he played Jimmy Webb classics like "Galveston" and "Wichita Lineman." Glen could pick a guitar as well.

TMcD had heard of this outdoor concert benefit for farmers in Champaign, Ill., and did I want to go? I immediately told him no. I couldn't sit outside and listen to country music all day. Because, what else would farmers listen to?

But TMcD was insistent. "Listen, if I BUY your ticket, will you go?"

I still said no.

I couldn't even look past the fact it was a benefit for struggling farmers.

It was official; I had become a music snob. And I was too stupid to know it.

In the meantime, I had another friend who lived in Evansville, Ind. He also was a huge music fan. He had a room with nothing but album racks (like the ones you'd see in record stores) chock-full of discs. Some of our pals were getting together and did I want to go? I said sure! It was the same weekend as the outdoor concert and I hadn't seen many of those folks in a while.

The Wednesday before, TMcD came up to me and handed me a ticket. "I have an extra ticket. It's free. It's yours if you want it."

I told him I had made other plans.

It is almost 30 years since this happened and I am still kicking myself for my prejudice and stupidity. Because, as you may have already guessed, the event TcMcD so graciously and generously invited me to was the very first Farm-Aid.

Here's who I missed seeing (in alphabetical order):

Alabama, Hoyt Axton, The Beach Boys, The Blasters, Bon Jovi, Glen Campbell, Johnny Cash, David Allen Coe, John Conlee, The Charlie Daniels Band, John Denver, Bob Dylan, John Fogerty, Foreigner, Vince Gill, Arlo Guthrie, Sammy Hagar, Merle Haggard, Daryl Hall, Emmylou Harris, Don Henley, Waylon Jennings, Billy Joel, Randy Newman, George Jones, Rickie Lee Jones, B.B. King, Carole King, Kris Kristofferson, Huey Lewis, Loretta Lynn, John Mellencamp, Roger Miller, Joni Mitchell, The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Willie Nelson, Roy Orbison, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Charley Pride, Bonnie Raitt, Lou Reed, Kenny Rogers, Brian Setzer, Sissy Spacek, Tanya Tucker, Eddie Van Halen, Debra Winger, Neil Young, Dave Milsap, Joe Ely, Judy Rodman, X.

I should say here's who I missed seeing in person. I spent the whole weekend in Evansville with my friends watching the concert on TV.

I told my friend I turned town a free ticket to Farm-Aid. His eyebrows raised for just a moment. Then he squinted, laughed and said: "You, sir, are an idiot!"

I couldn't disagree.

TMcD came by my house when he got back to town. "I have something for you," he said. It was a Farm-Aid T-Shirt with all the acts I missed. I still have it.

Some of these acts I made a point to see later on. Some, such as Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, Lou Reed and George Jones, I will never see.

Excuse me while I kick myself again.

From there on, I took TMcD's advice. I started to listen to country music and realized good music is good music. I started listening to the old masters like Patsy Cline, Loretta Lynn and Faron Young. I fell in love with Cline. A friend's father played her songs all the time and we didn't appreciate what we were listening to. I learned Willie Nelson wrote Cline's best known song, "Crazy." So, I started listening to Willie Nelson with a passion. Willie got me interested in Merle Haggard, Waylon Jennings and Townes Van Zandt.

Later, I moved to Dallas. I'd heard about Willie's Fourth of July concerts, which were in a tiny rural town called Carl's Corner. This town of 173 was founded by Willie's friend, Carl Cornelius. It's not much more than Carl's truck stop. Wanting to sell liquor in a dry area, Carl had his truck stop incorporated into a town.

This concert I went to. And it did not disappoint. I made my way to the front row and stayed there. My favorite memory was Roger Miller singing "King Of The Road" and "Dang Me."

When Willie came to Peoria with Bob Dylan in 2004 to play outdoors at O'Brien Field (now Dozer Park), I took Heddy (wife). She's not a big C&W gal but likes Willie. We'd already seen Dylan but she had never seen Nelson. Besides, when the "Red-Headed Stranger" comes to call in your town, you go see him.

Willie played in a thunderstorm. I remember after one particularly nasty lightning bolt got the crowd cheering, he looked out and worriedly asked, "Y'all doing alright out there?"

Heddy and I first danced to "Crazy" at a Terre Haute wedding. And that was the first song we danced to at our wedding, much to the amusement and astonishment of our guests.

What TMcD taught me about country music allowed me to appreciate other types. This includes polka. This includes avant-garde. This includes show tunes. This includes gospel. This includes rap, which has a bad reputation (or "bad rap" for those who like bad puns) mainly because some songs have violent lyrics. It wasn't "my baby done left me and my dog done died" like some country songs but again, you have to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Many rap songs have a positive message. Like TMcD said, "You've gotta listen to the words!"

I even grew to enjoy my parents' music. You know, the songs we kids used to think were "square!"

While in Texas, I taught myself to play guitar. Maybe play AT guitar is more accurate. I can strum, but my fingers are too small, chubby and clunky. But when I watched Dallasites like Stevie Ray Vaughan, Steve Miller and Stephen Stills play, I could understand what they're doing. One way I learned open guitar chords was by buying a book of Dan Fogelberg songs. I wasn't necessarily a fan of his but he wrote some good songs. Apparently, he had listened to his music teacher.

A good song is a good song is a good song, no matter what so-called genre experts try to pigeon-hole it in. Even if it's not a good song, there's always something like a good keyboard run or good guitar lick you can take away from it. Thanks to the Internet, I'm catching up on all aspects of the magic we call music.

You could use this as a metaphor for politics. Maybe you don't like the twang or the beat. Maybe you don't like the words. Maybe you don't like the singer. But if you listen closely and objectively, maybe there is something in the "song" that you can appreciate and maybe agree with it.

Leaving the Civic Center, Heddy and I walked past CS&N's buses. Outside were fans with albums waiting for autographs. "I think they're already in the bus," said Heddy. "You're probably right," I replied. But if they weren't, I would've liked to have waited for them. I would've liked to have been able to ask them if, the next time they see Neil Young, if they could please talk him into playing in Peoria.

After all, I've been waiting 30 years.

Which I wouldn't have had to do if I had just listened to TMcD's words.

Streight: Use technology to help a music career

Dave Grohl of the Foo Fighters gives antiquated, insufficient advice to aspiring musicians. His formula for success: be a "badass player of your instrument" and "play a lot of live gigs." He says, "I don't understand technology."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OoevpPS0-k

Here we go again. The myth that if you build it, they will come. Not true. A musician today has to be more than "awesome" (which is rare). You have to get off your drunk and stoned ass and market your band.

Just being "bad ass" and playing live isn't enough anymore. It's unwise to give young musicians this old fashioned, outmoded advice. Being super proficient, or unusually creative/innovative, is key, but you have to go far beyond just playing your instrument fantastically.

Your band has to understand technology. You have to understand marketing and putting videos on YouTube and posting free mp3s on various music sharing sites. The days of just playing live, drinking beer, and hitting on groupies, and hoping to be discovered, are over.

There's too much music available now, much of it for free. It's harder to get attention. People can listen to tons of great music without paying for it, some legal, some pirated. People don't buy CDs as much. In fact, they frequently don't even care who an artist is, they just buy songs off iTunes. Notice how MTV videos just flash the name of the music artist and song title at the end of a song, barely giving you enough time to catch the information.

It seems to be all about the individual tune now, not so much the band.

Joe Walsh is another old school rock musician who is complaining about the evolution of music. He gripes about the dominance of electronics, virtual instruments, loops, samples, auto-tuning, etc., but the minute anybody plugs a guitar into an amp or sings into a PA system, you've got electronically enhanced music.

http://www.savingcountrymusic.com/joe-walsh-twists-off-on-the-state-of-music-today

According to Joe Walsh's recent rant:

"Records, record stores, record sales, it's all gone. And it's up to the young musicians to try and figure it out. There's no money in it, no record companies. It's free, you can download it. Nobody gets paid, so they can't afford to make music. That's what's happening.

"And they're just cranking out music that is just a recipe.

"You know, nobody is playing at the same time. Everybody's adding on virtual instruments that don't exist on to a drum machine that somebody programmed. And you can tell in the music that's out now. It's all been programmed. There's no mojo. There's nobody testifying.

"There's not the magic of a human performance, which is never perfect. And the magic of a human performance is what we all know and love in the old records, by the way they were made. And it's all gone."

Of course, these are absurd allegations. "Nobody gets paid"? "There's no money it it"? He's talking about the old way of doing things. There is "human performance" in orchestrating loops and samples and in incorporating virtual instruments. I like it when both old acoustic instruments and new digital music tools are combined.

Classical musicians complained about the "unbearable noise" of jazz. Jazz musicians complained about the rise of blues and rock music. Folk absolutists hated it and heckled when Dylan played an electric guitar at the 1964 Newport Folk Festival. Now rock musicians are complaining about rap and EDM (electronic dance music), which has invaded the country music genre.

Purists would demand a return to beating on hollow logs, singing without microphones and strumming only acoustic lutes. Music and music distribution is evolving. You either evolve with it or you are likely to perish in obscurity.

You can "be awesome" all you want but nobody will know about your "awesomeness" if all you do is play gigs, drink beer, get stoned, and flirt with groupies, which is all most musicians want to do. They don't even have anybody taking photographs, audio recording or videotaping their live shows. If they're so proud of their music, why do they do nothing to preserve or promote it?

How many live bands have you seen that don't even have their band name on the drum or a big poster above them so you know what their name is? How many times have you seen band members wearing the tee shirts of other bands, just adding to the confusion?

Dave Grohl didn't make it because he was badass. He had a promotion machine and record label behind him. Mick Jagger has a degree from the London School of Economics. The smart bands are using every technology they can find to create, promote, and distribute their music. Those who don't are trapped in dive bars doing '80s cover songs to eke out a meager living.

Rated PG: An EP!C inspiration

When a pretty young lady named Dominique typed on her computer Thursday night at the Bon Appetit event in East Peoria, her message was intended to inspire the audience of several hundred. It did that.

Dominique, however, is wheelchair bound and unable to use her hands. The mere fact she was able to use a special software program to type her message using her cheek was inspirational enough. As she typed in the message that the computer then read aloud, you could have heard the proverbial pin drop in the ballroom of the Embassy Suites Hotel and Convention Center.

Her message explained the design of the piece of jewelry created by Bremer Jewelry goldsmith A.J. Boone that was raffled off during the event. The design was Dominique's and it represented what EP!C, the organization once known as PARC that works for people with developmental disabilities, has meant to her through her life. There weren't many dry eyes when the message was finished.

And it was just the start of an evening that was uplifting, fulfilling and filling.

Bon Appetit is one of EP!C's top fundraisers. It includes a cook-off involving several of the Peoria area's top chefs and a cooking demonstration by a nationally known chef. The meal served to the guests are from the special guest's recipes and part of the meal is prepared by that chef.

This year's guest chef was herself inspirational. Christine Ha was the season three winner of Master Chef, the Fox television cooking competition show hosted by world renowned chef Gordon Ramsey. She defeated more than 30,000 other home cooks across the country to win the Master Chef title.

Ha is blind.

Ha explained that an autoimmune disease caused her to lose her eyesight gradually and she was an adult by the time she was legally blind. That, she added, was also about the time she was starting to excel as a cook.

A Houston native and daughter of Vietnamese parents, Ha started cooking for pleasure. "I started with an old cookbook and some used pots and pans and utensils," she said.

While she lamented for a while that her blindness likely would prevent her from doing what she loved most, she didn't give in to self-pity.

"Knowing I could bring jot to others is what really led to my love of cooking. And being stubborn by nature, I didn't want to give it up," Ha said in explaining that she finds ways to overcome the blindness to continue cooking her way. Those include taste, smell and even the feel of ingredients.

Her way, she joked, doesn't normally means in a dress and high heels, which is what she was wearing while doing her demonstration, which was shown on two large screens in the ballroom for those not close to the stage. "That plus the cocktails" could affect the demonstration, she joked.

Ha had no trouble joking about her blindness, including while using a sharp knife to cut into bean pods. "I hope I don't bleed. But if I do, it's ok. Nobody is going to taste this," she said, referring to the fact the demonstration dessert was not for consumption.

Ha's first cookbook, Recipes from My Home Kitchen: Asian and American Comfort Food, was available for purchase (and she autographed them after the dinner) along with a cookbook of recipes from the seven local competitors in this year's Bon Appetit. Those chefs were William Barnett and Chris Castro of Lutheran Hillside Village, Dustin Allen of Edge by Chef Dustin Allen, Hugh Higgins of Hearth, Leo Carney of Kickapoo Creek Wintery, Tony Egan of the Creve Coeur Club, and Vince Swanson of Cracked Pepper, Salt and Sugar.

The finalists were Castro and Swanson and they had to each convey their plan and inspiration for an All-American burger to a culinary student at Illinois Central College, where the competition took place. With 30 minutes left, the chefs took over the cooking and they had to incorporate into the meal the mystery basket ingredient, peanut butter.

The winner of the local competition, announced Thursday night, was Swanson.

As I noted, it was an inspiring event. But nothing topped the inspiration of Dominique and her family. Her father spoke of how he and his wife wondered for years what thoughts their daughter was capable of having but unable to communicate. The computer program that enabled her to express herself, he said, "finally showed us she was in there."

Dominique, he said, is a huge sports fan. She loves basketball, the Chicago Bulls and knows even now when the first Monday Night Football game of next season will be played. Now what father doesn't dream of having a daughter like that?

EPIC stands for Empowering People. Inspiring Capabilities, Dominique is a beautiful example of how finding a way to empower a person with a developmental disability can inspire amazing capabilities.