flicks
(an occasional series)
Rosco Gordon & The Red Tops, “Chicken In The Rough”
Rock Baby, Rock It! (1957)
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lagniappe
radio
Lloyd Knibb Memorial Broadcast: Eastern Standard Time, WKCR-FM (broadcasting from Columbia University), 5/21/11 (archived).
Who else (besides, of course, Bob Dylan) has played so many different roles so brilliantly?
Miles Davis (with Robben Ford & guest Carlos Santana, guitars), “Burn”
Live, Giants Stadium, East Rutherford, New Jersey, 6/15/86
Listen to stuff long enough and it changes—or you do, anyway. Once I might have faulted this for being repetitive. But that’s a bit like faulting roast beef for being meat. Of course it’s repetitive. That’s part of what makes it soar.
More? Here.
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lagniappe
listening room: what’s playing
• Rashied Ali Quintet, Live In Europe (Survival Records)
• Paul Motian (with Chris Potter, Jason Moran), Lost In A Dream (ECM)
• Charlie Parker, The Complete Royal Roost Live Recordings on Savoy, Vol. 3 (Columbia Japan)
• Eric Dolphy At The Five Spot, Vol. 2 (with Booker Little, Mal Waldron, Richard Davis, Ed Blackwell; Prestige)
• Various Artists, Fire In My Bones: Raw + Rare + Other-Worldly African-American Gospel (1944-2007) (Tompkins Square)
• Reverend Charlie Jackson, God’s Got It: The Legendary Booker and Jackson Singles (CaseQuarter)
• Group Doueh, Guitar Music from the Western Sahara (Sublime Frequencies)
• Mozart: Piano Sonata No. 8 in A Minor, Helene Grimaud, Resonances (Deutsche Grammophon)
• Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 23 (“Appasionata”) and No. 29 (“Hammerklavier”), Solomon, The Master Pianist (EMI Classics)
• Anton Webern: String Quartet, Six Bagatelles for String Quartet, String Quartet Op. 28, LaSalle Quartet (Brilliant Classics)
• Arnold Schoenberg: String Quartet in D major, LaSalle Quartet (Brilliant Classics)
• Roger Sessions: String Quartet No. 2, Julliard String Quartet (Composers Recordings)
• Morton Feldman: For Bunita Marcus, John Tilbury, Morton Feldman, All Piano (London HALL)
• WKCR-FM (broadcasting from Columbia University)
—Bird Flight (Phil Schaap, jazz [Charlie Parker])
—Morning Classical (Various)
—Amazing Grace (Various)
• WFMU-FM
—Mudd Up! (DJ/Rupture, “new bass and beats”)
—Sinner’s Crossroads (Kevin Nutt, gospel)
—Give The Drummer Some (Doug Schulkind, sui generis)
—Fool’s Paradise (Rex, sui generis)
—Transpacific Sound Paradise (Rob Weisberg, “popular and unpopular music from around the world”)
scenes from New Orleans
(an occasional series)
DJA-Rara, live, New Orleans (Jazz Fest), 5/1/11
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lagniappe
“It’s a fascinating time for Haitian music,” said Ned Sublette, author of “The World that Made New Orleans.” “Haitians voted for the music ticket [electing kompa singer Michel Martelly president]. You cannot deny the importance of communication through music in Haiti. And this is something New Orleanians know well.”
—Katy Reckdahl, The Times-Picayune (New Orleans), 4/29/11
passings
(an occasional series)
Lloyd Knibb, drummer (Skatalites, et al.)
March 8, 1931-May 12, 2011
Lloyd Knibb’s importance to Jamaican music can’t be overstated. The inventor of the ska beat at Coxson Dodd’s Studio One, Knibb created a sound that spread like wildfire the world over.
—Carter Van Pelt, host, Eastern Standard Time, WKCR-FM
Skatalites, “Freedom Sound,” live, Belgium (Lokerse Festival), 1997
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Skatalites, “Latin Go Ska,” live, Los Angeles, 2007
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Skatalites, live, Los Angeles, 2007
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Skatalites, “(Straighten Up And) Fly Right”
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lagniappe
reading table
Spring
It would be
good to shrug
out of winter
as cicadas do:
look: a crisp
freestanding you
and you walking
off, soft as
new.—Kay Ryan
A world without drums?
What would it sound like?
Rashied Ali, drummer, July 1, 1933-August 12, 2009
Rashied Ali Quintet (RA, drums; Joris Teepe, bass; Greg Murphy, piano; Lawrence Clark, tenor saxophone; Josh Evans, trumpet), live, Europe, 2008
#1
Vodpod videos no longer available.*****
#2A
Vodpod videos no longer available.***
#2B
Vodpod videos no longer available.***
#2C
Vodpod videos no longer available.More? Here.
scenes from New Orleans
an occasional series
Some music you listen to. Some you inhabit.
Rara Haiti, live, New Orleans (Jazz Fest), 5/11
Vodpod videos no longer available.Sometimes it takes years—decades even—before you’re really able to hear somebody’s music. The other day, for instance, I put on a CD by this guy, a jazz pianist and composer whose music, which I first encountered 20 or 30 years ago, I’d admired more than enjoyed. I put this on expecting to do some work while it played in the background. But it refused to cooperate. Instead of staying put, it jumped out of the speakers, grabbed me, wouldn’t let go. No work got done.
Herbie Nichols, pianist, composer
January 3, 1919-April 12, 1963
“The Third World”
With Al McKibbon, bass; Art Blakey, drums
Blue Note, 1955
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“Applejackin'”
With Al McKibbon, bass; Max Roach, drums
Blue Note, 1955
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“House Party Starting”
With Al McKibbon, bass; Max Roach, drums
Blue Note, 1955
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lagniappe
reading table
Like so many of life’s varieties of experience, the novelty of a diagnosis of malignant cancer has a tendency to wear off.
—Christopher Hitchens, “Unspoken Truths,” Vanity Fair, 6/11
scenes from New Orleans
(an occasional series)
Free Spirit Brass Band, live, New Orleans (Bourbon Street), 3/20/11
Vodpod videos no longer available.More Hound Dog
Hound Dog Taylor & The Houserockers (Brewer Phillips, guitar; Ted Harvey, drums), “Roll Your Moneymaker,” live, Ann Arbor Blues Festival, 1973
Vodpod videos no longer available.More? Here. And here. And here.
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lagniappe
reading table
M. Abel Bonnard, of Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, who was playing billiards, put out his left eye falling on his cue.
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On the bowling lawn a stroke leveled M. Andre, 75, of Levallois. While his ball was still rolling he was no more.
—Félix Fénéon, trans. Luc Sante, Novels in Three Lines (collecting, as the back cover puts it, “more than a thousand items that appeared anonymously in the French newspaper Le Matin in 1906—true stories of murder, mayhem, and everyday life”)
If you were 23 (like my son Alex), this might be your favorite band too.
The Pains of Being Pure At Heart
Live, Chicago (Lincoln Hall), 4/27/11
“Belong”
Vodpod videos no longer available.***
“Heart In Your Heartbreak”
Vodpod videos no longer available.***
“Everything With You”
Vodpod videos no longer available.
music clip of the day 