US Army Veteran Jaymes Poling and Jazz Trumpeter Dominick Farinacci

Modern Warrior LIVE is a unique and moving theatrical experience that mixes first-person narrative with music and multimedia to chronicle U.S. Army veteran Jaymes Poling’s story of his three deployments to Afghanistan and subsequent transition back home. In today’s podcast, I speak with its co-creators, Poling and jazz trumpeter Dominick Farinacci, about the conception of Modern Warrior LIVE and their process of working together—both in creating the show and performing in it. Poling discusses his own challenges when transitioning to civilian life and the importance of writing to his healing process. They also talk about the sense of responsibility they feel to the audience, their outreach to veteran communities, the centrality of talk-backs as part of the show, and their making local mental health and veteran resources available to the audience.

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