like nothing else
“Old Man Dancing” (Carla Bley, 1936-): Chet Doxas (clarinet, tenor saxophone), Carla Bley (piano), Karen Mantler (keyboard), Steve Swallow (bass), 2020
**********
lagniappe
random sights
yesterday, Oak Park, Ill.

**********
reading table
This is the point in prefaces where I customarily say something nice about my wife. This time, however, I can’t think of anything that even comes anywhere near doing her justice. Her name is Susan Patek Booth.
Berkeley, California
May 3, 1997—Stephen Booth (1933-2020), from Precious Nonsense: The Gettysburg Address, Ben Jonson’s Epitaphs on His Children, and Twelfth Night (1998)
*****
radio
Today, Thelonious Monk’s birthday, it’s all Monk, all day at WKCR (Columbia University).
timeless
This clip, which I bumped into the other day, may be the best I have ever seen of an artist whose music means as much to me as anyone’s.
Thelonious Monk (1917-1982, piano, compositions) with Charlie Rouse (tenor saxophone), Butch Warren (b), Frankie Dunlop (drums), live (TV show: “Evidence,” “Blue Monk,” Just a Gigolo” [L. Casucci, J. Brammer, I. Caesar], “Ba-Lue Bolivar Ba-Lues,” “Epistrophy”), Tokyo (Japan), 1963
**********
lagniappe
random sights
other day, Oak Park, Ill.

more
Jaimie Branch’s Fly or Die (JB [1983-2022, trumpet, voice, percussion, composition] with Lester St. Louis [cello, voice, percussion], Jason Ajemian [bass], Chad Taylor [drums, mbira, voice]), “Prayer for Amerikka,” live, New York, 2021
**********
lagniappe
art beat: more
William Klein (1926-2022), 3 Kids + Harmonica, New York, 1955
sounds of San Francisco
Charles Lloyd Quartet (CL [1938-], tenor saxophone, flute, compositions; Keith Jarrett [1945-], piano, soprano saxophone; Ron McClure [1941-], bass; Jack DeJohnette [1942-], drums), live (TV show), San Francisco, 1968
**********
lagniappe
random sights
other day, Oak Park, Ill.

more
Camila Nebbia (tenor saxophone), Michael Formanek (bass), Vinny Sperrazza (drums), live, New York (Downtown Music Gallery), 8/28/22
**********
lagniappe
random sights
other day, Chicago

**********
reading table
Life is not made for meetings;
like stars at opposite ends of the sky we move.—Tu Fu (aka Du Fu, 712-770), from “Presented to Wei Pa, Gentleman in Retirement,” translated from the Chinese by Burton Watson (The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry, 1984)