Friday, May 23rd
what’s new
Where would Western civilization be without the invention of the three-minute pop song?
Dream Chart Top 40 Songs: May 2014 (5/24/14)
music clip of the day
jazz/blues/rock/classical/gospel/more
Category: hard-to-peg
2014
Thursday, May 22nd
Happy (100th) Birthday, Sonny!
Sun Ra (AKA Herman “Sonny” Blount), May 22, 1914-May 30, 1993, keyboard player, composer, bandleader, singular spirit
Today, celebrating his centennial, we revisit a few favorites.
Sun Ra All Stars (SR, keyboards; Don Cherry, pocket trumpet, vocals; Lester Bowie, trumpet; Archie Shepp, tenor saxophone, vocals; John Gilmore, tenor saxophone; Marshall Allen, alto saxophone, percussion; Philly Joe Jones, drums; Clifford Jarvis, drums; Famadou Don Moye, drums, percussion), live, Germany (Berlin), 1983
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Sun Ra & His Arkestra, live, Ann Arbor Blues & Jazz Festival, 1974
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Sun Ra Arkestra (SR, piano; June Tyson, vocals; John Gilmore, tenor saxophone, et al.), “Springtime Again,” live, Rome, 1980
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Sun Ra (piano) & Walt Dickerson (vibraphone), “Astro” (Visions, 1978)
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lagniappe
radio
WKCR (Columbia University): Sun Ra all day—tomorrow, too.
2014
Tuesday, May 20th
what’s new
M.I.A. & The Partysquad, “Double Bubble Trouble” (directed by M.I.A.)
2014
Monday, May 19th
Some people behave strangely in their own living rooms. Others do it on national TV.
Van Morrison, Sinead O’Connor, The Chieftains, “Have I Told You Lately,” live (Late Show with David Letterman), 1997
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lagniappe
art beat
Garry Winogrand (1928-1984), New York, 1969
2014
Saturday, May 17th
beyond category
John Zorn, Book of Angels (excerpts); Uri Caine, piano; Masada String Trio (Mark Feldman, violin; Erik Friedlander, cello;* Greg Cohen, bass); live, France (Marciac), 2008
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lagniappe
reading table
There’s a line in Tarkovsky’s Solaris: we never know when we’re going to die and because of that we are, at any given moment, immortal.
—Geoff Dyer, “Diary,” London Review of Books, 4/3/14
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*It’s all related: Erik’s the son of photographer Lee Friedlander, whose work is often featured here.
2014
Friday, May 16th
two takes
“You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere” (B. Dylan)
Mary Chapin Carpenter, Rosanne Cash, Shawn Colvin (with G. E. Smith, guitar), live, New York, 1992
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Bob Dylan, live, England (Bournemouth), 1997
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lagniappe
art beat
Lee Friedlander (1934-), Cherokee Park, Louisville, Kentucky, 1994
2014
Saturday, May 10th
sounds of New York
Nate Wooley’s Seven Storey Mountain,* live, New York, 2014
#1
#2
#3
#4
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lagniappe
art beat: more from Thursday at the Art Institute of Chicago
Christopher Wool (1955-)
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*Nate Wooley, trumpet; Chris Dingman, vibraphone; Matt Moran, vibraphone; C. Spencer Yeh, violin; Ben Vida, electronics; Chris Corsano and Ryan Sawyer, drums; Gareth Flowers, Tim Leopold, and Chris DeMeglio, trumpets; Chris McIntyre, Jen Baker, and Will Baker, trombones.
2014
Monday, May 5th
sounds of New York
M.A.K.U. Sound System, “El Jugo,” 2013
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lagniappe
art beat
Helen Levitt (1913-2009), New York, 1972
2014
Friday, May 2nd
sounds of Manchester
The Warehouse Project (feat. Diplo, Four Tet, Nicolas Jaar, Skream, et al.), 2012
music clip of the day 