never enough
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), Suite No. 3 in C major for Unaccompanied Cello; Anner Bylsma, live, 2000
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lagniappe
art beat: Thursday at the Art Institute of Chicago
Paul Gauguin (1848-1903), Vase in the Form of an Exotic Plant, 1886/87
astonishing
Lee Hyla (1952-2014), String Quartet No. 4 (1999); Spektral Quartet, live, Northwestern University (Evanston, Ill.), 2011
Need a jolt?
Felipe Lara (1979-), Corde Vocale (2006)
Mivos Quartet, live (studio performance), New York, 2013
This I listened to for the first time yesterday. Then I listened again. And again.
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lagniappe
radio
Tuesday is the centennial of Billie Holiday’s birth and WKCR (Columbia University) is celebrating in the best possible way, featuring her music all day tomorrow and, because twenty-four hours just aren’t enough, the next day too.
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taking a break
I’m taking some time off—back in a while.
otherworldly
Turgut Ercetin (1983-), String Quartet No. 1 (“December”); The Jack Quartet, live, Stanford University, 2011
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lagniappe
reading table
Lacan said that there was surely something ironic about Christ’s injunction to love thy neighbour as thyself—because actually, of course, people hate themselves.
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We know almost nothing about ourselves because we judge ourselves before we have a chance to see ourselves.
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Self-criticism is an unforbidden pleasure: we seem to relish the way it makes us suffer.
—Adam Phillips, “Against Self-Criticism,” London Review of Books, 3/5/15
never enough
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), Suite No. 5 in C minor for Unaccompanied Cello; Anner Bylsma, live, 2000
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lagniappe
reading table
I haven’t got a kopeck, but as I see it, it’s not the person with a lot of money who is rich, but rather the one who has the wherewithal to be alive here and now in the lush, bountiful setting bestowed upon us by early spring.
—Anton Chekhov (1860-1904), letter to Lidia Avilova, April 29, 1892 (trans. from Russian by Cathy Popkin [Anton Chekhov’s Selected Stories, Cathy Popkin, ed.])
Soundtrack for your day?
Peter Brotzmann Tentet,* live, Atlanta, 2002
*PB, reeds; Ken Vandermark, reeds; Mats Gustafsson, reeds; Mars Williams, reeds; Joe McPhee, trumpet; Jeb Bishop, trombone; Fred Longberg-Holm, cello; Kent Kessler, bass; Hamid Drake, drums; Michael Zerang, drums.
Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.
—Muhammad Ali
Cecil Taylor Quintet (CT, piano; Harri Sjostrom, soprano saxophone; Tristan Honsinger, cello; Thurman Barker, marimba, percussion; Paul Lovens, drums), live, Germany (Hamburg), 1995
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lagniappe
art beat
William Klein (1928-), Blacks + Pepsi (AKA Moves + Pepsi)
Harlem, New York, 1955
Twenty-four hours ago I’d never heard of this piece, nor this composer. Now I’ve listened to it, hungrily, twice. What a world.
Sulkhan Tsintsadze (1925-1991), String Quartet No. 6 (1968)
sounds of Mali (day three)
Ballake Sissoko (kora) and Vincent Segal (cello), live, Washington D.C., 2011
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lagniappe
random thoughts
Perpetual astonishment is one plausible response to being alive in this world. Abject despair is another. The list goes on.
music clip of the day 