music clip of the day

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Month: December, 2014

2014

Wednesday, December 31st

Morton Feldman (1926-1987), Patterns in a Chromatic Field (1981)

Arne Deforce (cello) & Yutaka Oya (piano)
Live (excerpts), Belgium (Kortrijk), 2013

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Charles Curtis (cello) & Aleck Karis (piano)
Recording, 2004


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lagniappe

random thoughts: New Year’s resolution #4

No matter how much I get out, it never fails. Whenever I experience live music, as I did Sunday when I heard this otherworldly piece played, wonderfully, by cellist Mira Luxion and pianist Andy Costello (Constellation, Chicago), I leave with the same thought—you really ought to do this more often. 

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2014

Tuesday, December 30th

Bela Bartok (1881-1945), Piano Concerto No. 1 (1926); Orchestre de Paris (Pierre Boulez, cond.) with Maurizio Pollini (piano), live, Paris, 2001

1st movt.

 

2nd movt.

 

3rd movt.

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lagniappe

musical thoughts

In this city there is no segregation: Bela Bartok lives down the block from R. H. Harris, Morton Feldman around the corner from D’Angelo.

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2014

Monday, December 29th

what’s new

Dirty Beaches, “Time Washes Everything Away,” 12/14 (video)

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lagniappe

random thoughts: New Year’s resolution #3

Give up the wish to live in a world where making New Year’s resolutions would be something more than a reminder of how laughably little is within our control.

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2014

Sunday, December 28th

three takes

“His Eye Is on the Sparrow” (C. Martin, C. Gabriel)

Soul Stirrers (feat. R. H. Harris, lead vocals), recording, 1946


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Harmonizing Four (feat. Jimmy Jones, bass), recording, 1958


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Kathleen Battle, Vienna Symphony Orchestra (Michael Tilson Thomas, cond.), live, Vienna, 1983

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lagniappe

random thoughts: New Year’s resolution #2

Take nothing for granted.

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2014

Saturday, December 27th

Five hours?

As far as I’m concerned, this could go on forever.

Morton Feldman (1926-1987), For Philip Guston (1984); Claire Chase (flute, alto flute, piccolo), Steven Schick (percussion), Sarah Rothenberg (piano, celesta), live (3:50-), Houston (Rothko Chapel), 11/2/14

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lagniappe

random thoughts: New Year’s resolution #1

Quit thinking other people should be more like me—if anything, be thankful they aren’t.

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2014

Friday, December 26th

sounds of New Orleans

Henry Butler (piano, vocals), Steven Bernstein (trumpet), Herlin Riley (drums), et al., “Some Iko,” recording session (Viper’s Drag, 2014)

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lagniappe

reading table

One must always fight back, not in the hope of winning but just to delay the moment of losing.

—Samantha Harvey, The Wilderness

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2014

Thursday, December 25th

Merry Christmas

Bessie Smith (with Joe Smith, cornet; Charlie Green, trombone; Fletcher Henderson, piano), “At the Christmas Ball,” 1925


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Blind Lemon Jefferson, “Christmas Eve Blues,” 1928


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Victoria Spivey (with Lonnie Johnson, guitar), “Christmas Morning Blues,” 1928


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Leroy Carr, “Christmas In Jail—Ain’t That A Pain,” 1929


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Johnny Moore’s Three Blazers (feat. Charles Brown, vocals, keyboards), “Merry Christmas, Baby,” 1947


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Lowell Fulson, “Lonesome Christmas (I & II),” 1950


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Sonny Boy Williamson II, “Sonny Boy’s Christmas Blues,” 1951


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John Lee Hooker, “Blues For Christmas,” 1959

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2014

Wednesday, December 24th

passings

Joe Cocker, singer, May 20, 1944-December 22, 2014

“The Letter,” live (with Leon Russell, piano, et al.), 1970

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2014

Tuesday, December 23rd

Here are two more takes on the song we heard Sunday (“Leaning on the Everlasting Arms”)—both from Hollywood.

Robert Mitchum with Lillian Gish, The Night of the Hunter, 1955

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Van Johnson, et al.,  A Human Comedy, 1943

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lagniappe

art beat: more from Friday at the Art Institute of Chicago

Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890), A Peasant Woman Digging in Front of Her Cottage, c. 1885

4118_1626411

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2014

Monday, December 22nd

genius at play

Henry Threadgill (alto saxophonist, composer, bandleader) leading a master class (excerpt), Big Indian, N.Y. (Creative Music Studio), 2014

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More.

Henry Threadgill and His Very Very Circus, “Too Much Sugar for a Dime,” live, New York, c. 1993

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Today Henry, who’s been lifting my spirits for over three decades, enters the MCOTD Hall of Fame, joining tenor saxophonist Von Freeman, trumpeter Lester Bowie, poets John Berryman, William Bronk, and Wislawa Szymborska, and gospel singer Dorothy Love Coates.

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lagniappe

art beat: more from Friday at the Art Institute of Chicago

Claude Monet (1840-1926), Irises (1914/17)

202092_3185807

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radio

One of my favorite musical events begins tonight: the annual Bach Festival on WKCR (Columbia University), which runs through midnight New Year’s Eve.

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