Career

Greenfield began his career as a sports writer. He has published book reviews in New West magazine and The New York Times Book Review

The New York Times Book Review

The New York Times Book Review is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to The New York Times in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely read book review publications in the industry. The offices are located near Times Square in New York...

.

From 1970 to 1972 Greenfield was employed as an associate editor with Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...

magazine's London bureau. During this time he interviewed numerous musicians and writers, including Jack Bruce

Jack Bruce

John Symon Asher "Jack" Bruce is a Scottish musician and songwriter, respected as a founding member of the British psychedelic rock power trio, Cream, for a solo career that spans several decades, and for his participation in several well-known musical ensembles...

, John Cale

John Cale

John Davies Cale, OBE is a Welsh musician, composer, singer-songwriter and record producer who was a founding member of the experimental rock band The Velvet Underground....

, Neil Young

Neil Young

Neil Percival Young, OC, OM is a Canadian singer-songwriter who is widely regarded as one of the most influential musicians of his generation...

, Elton John

Elton John

Sir Elton Hercules John, CBE, Hon DMus is an English rock singer-songwriter, composer, pianist and occasional actor...

, Nico

Nico

Nico was a German singer, lyricist, composer, musician, fashion model, and actress, who initially rose to fame as a Warhol Superstar in the 1960s...

, the Rolling Stones, Jackie Lomax

Jackie Lomax

John Richard 'Jackie' Lomax is a British guitarist and singer/songwriter best known for his association with George Harrison and Eric Clapton...

, Leon Russell

Leon Russell

Claude Russell Bridges , known professionally as Leon Russell, is an American musician and songwriter, who has recorded as a session musician, sideman, and maintained a solo career in music....

, Stone the Crows

Stone the Crows

Stone the Crows were a blues band formed in Glasgow in late 1969.-History:The band were formed after Maggie Bell was introduced to Les Harvey by his elder brother, Alex Harvey...

, Woody Allen

Woody Allen

Woody Allen is an American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, jazz musician, author, and playwright. Allen's films draw heavily on literature, sexuality, philosophy, psychology, Jewish identity, and the history of cinema...

 and Germaine Greer

Germaine Greer

Germaine Greer is an Australian writer, academic, journalist and scholar of early modern English literature, widely regarded as one of the most significant feminist voices of the later 20th century....

. His 1971 interview with Keith Richards

Keith Richards

Keith Richards is an English musician, songwriter, and founding member of the Rolling Stones. Rolling Stone magazine said Richards had created "rock's greatest single body of riffs", and placed him as the "10th greatest guitarist of all time." Fourteen songs written by Richards and songwriting...

 in the south of France at Villa Nellcôte

Nellcote

Nellcôte is a 19th century sixteen-room mansion on the waterfront of Villefranche-sur-Mer in the Côte d'Azur region of southern France...

, Villefranche-sur-Mer

Villefranche-sur-Mer

Villefranche-sur-Mer is a commune in the Alpes-Maritimes department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region on the French Riviera.-Geography:...

, was included in the book Exile, a collection of photographs by Dominique Tarlé, Genesis Publications

Genesis Publications

Genesis Publications Limited is a British publishing company founded in 1974 by Brian Roylance, a former student of the London College of Printing. His aim was to create a company in the traditions of the private press, true to the arts of printing and book binding...

 (2001).

Greenfield was a popular music critic for Boston After Dark. He was an adjunct professor of composition and literature at the University of San Francisco

University of San Francisco

The University of San Francisco , is a private, Jesuit/Catholic university located in San Francisco, California. Founded in 1855, USF was established as the first university in San Francisco. It is the second oldest institution for higher learning in California and the tenth-oldest university of...

, and has taught at Chapman University

Chapman University

Chapman University is a private, non-profit university located in Orange, California affiliated with the Christian Church . Known for its blend of liberal arts and professional programs, Chapman University encompasses seven schools and colleges: Lawrence and Kristina Dodge College of Film and Media...

 and Cabrillo College

Cabrillo College

Cabrillo College is a public community college offering associate degrees and certificates in more than 70 fields of study such as: engineering, computer science, allied health , public safety, marine biology and the visual and performing arts. The college itself is named after the explorer Juan...

.

He worked as a freelance journalist for Eye and Cavalier

Cavalier (magazine)

Cavalier is an American magazine that was launched by Fawcett Publications in 1952 and has continued for decades, eventually evolving into a Playboy-style men's magazine...

magazine. A 1969 Eye article profiled early free-form radio

Freeform (radio format)

Freeform, or freeform radio, is a radio station programming format in which the disc jockey is given total control over what music to play, regardless of music genre or commercial interests. Freeform radio stands in contrast to most commercial radio stations, in which DJs have little or no...

 at WFMU

WFMU

WFMU is a listener-supported, independent community radio station headquartered in Jersey City, New Jersey, United States, broadcasting at 91.1 MHz FM, presenting a freeform radio format...

 in East Orange, New Jersey

East Orange, New Jersey

East Orange is a city in Essex County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census the city's population 64,270, making it the state's 20th largest municipality, having dropped 5,554 residents from its population of 69,824 in the 2000 Census, when it was the state's 14th most...

 and other locations. The magazines Esquire

Esquire (magazine)

Esquire is a men's magazine, published in the U.S. by the Hearst Corporation. Founded in 1932, it flourished during the Great Depression under the guidance of founder and editor Arnold Gingrich.-History:...

, Playboy

Playboy

Playboy is an American men's magazine that features photographs of nude women as well as journalism and fiction. It was founded in Chicago in 1953 by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother. The magazine has grown into Playboy Enterprises, Inc., with...

, and GQ have published his short fiction.

Greenfield writes primarily on pop culture, and has published two novels. His first novel was Haymon’s Crowd (1978). In 1983 Greenfield wrote Temple a semi-autobiographical book and play about a young man who is the grandson of a Holocaust survivor and is obsessed with soul music.

In 2000, his one-man play, Bill Graham Presents, ran at the historic Canon Theater in Los Angeles. It was based on the biography Greenfield co-wrote about the legendary rock music promoter. Ron Silver

Ron Silver

Ronald Arthur "Ron" Silver was an American actor, director, producer, radio host and political activist.-Early life:...

 played Graham

Bill Graham

William Carvel "Bill" Graham, PC QC is a former Canadian politician, who served as Minister of Foreign Affairs, Minister of National Defence, and Leader of the Opposition and interim Leader of the Liberal Party of Canada.-Personal life:...

.

Nonfiction

• "S.T.P. - A Journey Through America With the Rolling Stones" (1974), (reissued in 2002 by Da Capo Press
  Da Capo Press
  Da Capo Press, is an American publishing company with headquarters in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1964 as a publisher of music books, as a division of Plenum Publishers. it had additional offices in offices in New York City, Philadelphia and Emeryville, California...
  
  )
• "The Spiritual Supermarket: An Account of Gurus Gone Public In America" (1975)
• "Bill Graham
  Bill Graham (promoter)
  Bill Graham was an American impresario and rock concert promoter from the 1960s until his death.-Early life:...
  
   Presents: My Life Inside Rock and Out", with Bill Graham. (1992) (reissued in 2004). winner, Ralph J. Gleason
  Ralph J. Gleason
  Ralph Joseph Gleason was an influential American jazz and pop music critic. He contributed for many years to the San Francisco Chronicle, was a founding editor of Rolling Stone magazine, and cofounder of the Monterey Jazz Festival.-Biography:Gleason was born in New York City and attended Columbia...
  
   Music Book Award, and the ASCAP-Deems Taylor
  Deems Taylor
  Joseph Deems Taylor was a U.S. composer, music critic, and promoter of classical music.-Career:Taylor initially planned to become an architect; however, despite minimal musical training he soon took to music composition. The result was a series of works for orchestra and/or voices...
  
   Award for Excellence.
• "Dark Star
  Dark Star (song)
  "Dark Star" is a song released as a single by the Grateful Dead. It was written by lyricist Robert Hunter and composed by lead guitarist Jerry Garcia; however, compositional credit is sometimes extended to include Phil Lesh, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart, the late Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, and Bob Weir...
  
  : An Oral Biography of Jerry Garcia
  Jerry Garcia
  Jerome John "Jerry" Garcia was an American musician best known for his lead guitar work, singing and songwriting with the band the Grateful Dead...
  
  " (Sep 1997)
• "Timothy Leary - A Biography", Harcourt Brace (2006)
• "Exile on Main St.
  Exile on Main St.
  Exile on Main St. is the tenth British and 12th American studio album by English rock band The Rolling Stones. Released as a double LP in May 1972, it draws on many genres including rock and roll, blues, soul, R&B, gospel and country. The release of Exile on Main St. met with mixed reviews, but is...
  
  : A Season in Hell with the Rolling Stones", Da Capo Press (Nov 2006)
• "Timothy Leary
  Timothy Leary
  Timothy Francis Leary was an American psychologist and writer, known for his advocacy of psychedelic drugs. During a time when drugs like LSD and psilocybin were legal, Leary conducted experiments at Harvard University under the Harvard Psilocybin Project, resulting in the Concord Prison...
  
  : An Experimental Life", narrated by Patrick Lawlor
  Patrick Lawlor
  Patrick Daniel Lawlor was a Canadian politician who served as the Ontario NDP Member of the Ontario legislature for the Toronto riding of Lakeshore from 1967 to 1981.-Background:...
  
  . unabridged edition, Blackstone Audio (2007)
• A Day in the Life: One Family, the Beautiful People, & the End of the Sixties, Da Capo Press, 2009. Biography of Formula One racedriver Tommy Weber and Susan Coriat, an upper class British couple, the parents of actor Jake Weber
  Jake Weber
  Jake Weber is an English actor, known in film for his role as Michael in Dawn of the Dead and for his role as Drew in Meet Joe Black...
  
  , who associated with sixties' music figures.

Television and film

• Co-writer of The '60s, an Emmy nominated mini-series
• Producer of three short documentary films on permanent display at the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame and Museum