Among the movers and shakers who met in New York last week to talk about climate change was Chuck Leavell, a slight, soft-spoken sixty-two-year-old piano player from Georgia. Though better known for the moving and shaking he does onstage—since 1982, he has been the Rolling Stones’ main keyboardist—Leavell has become an influential voice on an array of reforestation issues around the world. Heads of state have yet to find much common ground when it comes to climate change, but they appear to agree about the Rolling Stones. Presidents, senators, and high-ranking ministers all happily engage with Leavell about Stones songs, and when he smoothly changes the subject to wind farms, or biomass in Brazil, they listen.
Leavell was attending the U.N. Summit as a member of the Global Restoration Council, a…
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The New Yorker (Digital) - 1 Issue, Oct-06-14