Only a world this noisy could produce music this quiet.
Evan Parker (soprano saxophone), et al.,* live, London (Freedom of the City festival), 2011
*Heledd Francis Wright (flute), John Russell (guitar), Augusti Fernandez (piano), Adam Linson (bass), Toma Gouband (percussion), Lawrence Casserley (electronics), Matt Wright (electronics).
my kind of folks
Teletubbies (BBC, 1997-2001)
Yeah, I love Mozart and Chopin, but I don’t want to listen to them every day. I don’t want to listen to anything every day. This stuff, to these ears, is utterly exhilarating.
Nels Cline (guitar), Dave Rempis (saxophones), Devin Hoff (bass), Frank Rosaly (drums), live, Chicago (Hideout), 2011
#1
#2
**********
lagniappe
musical thoughts
I discovered that there’s a kind of a hidden connection between R&B and free jazz: the need for that kind of visceral connection with the audience and for something to happen that moves people. I think that beyond R&B, it’s a feature of black music — the moment the solo builds and builds and at a certain point, it hits that cry. Knowing when that needs to happen is something that players from that tradition seem to have.
—guitarist Marc Ribot
one thing after
another after another
after another after another after . . .
John Cage (1912-1992), Concert for Piano and Orchestra (1958); Variable Geometry (Jean-Phillippe Calvin, director), live, London, 2011
A performance like this can go wrong in so many ways. This one, to these ears, works wonderfully. Momentum, tautness, immediacy—it has them all.
**********
lagniappe
musical thoughts
Everything we do is music.
what’s new
Colin Stetson (saxophone), “In Mirrors,” “And In Truth” (feat. Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon), 4/13
Who better to sing about a ghost town than a band that’s survived not only Katrina but three—yes, three—homicides?*
Hot 8 Brass Band, “Ghost Town,” New Orleans, 2012
*As detailed in Wikipedia, in 1996 “seventeen-year-old trumpet player Jacob Johnson was found shot execution-style in his home”; in 2004 “trombone player Joseph ‘Shotgun Joe’ Williams was shot dead by police in controversial circumstances”; and in 2006 “drummer Dinerral “Dick” Shavers was shot and killed while driving with his family,” with a bullet intended for his fifteen-year-old stepson.
passings
Richie Havens, January 21, 1941-April 22, 2013
“All Along The Watchtower” (B. Dylan), live, Mountain Jam (Hunter, N.Y.), 2009
**********
lagniappe
reading table
Nakamichi, 1892 (Japanese Death Poems, Yoel Hoffman, ed.)
Ice in a hot world:
my life
melts.
There seem to be two possibilities here. One is that you’ll find this mesmerizing, as I do. The other is that it’ll drive you bonkers.
Roscoe Mitchell, alto saxophone, live, Italy (Bologna, Angelica Festival), 2011
**********
lagniappe
reading table
Wang Wei (699-759), “Deer Park”
(translated from Chinese by Gary Snyder)
Empty mountains:no one to be seen.Yet—hear—human sounds and echoes.Returning sunlightenters the dark woods;Again shiningon the green moss, above.
keep on dancing
Hieroglyphic Being (AKA Jamal Moss), Imaginary Soundscapes (B1), 2013
Who knew electronic music could be so warm, so joyous?
late yesterday afternoon
After a court hearing and a client meeting, I stopped at the Chicago Cultural Center, where this piece—on a scale many times larger than this—is installed through May 5th. One-word review: go.
Shawn Decker, Prairie
*****
As with an outdoor prairie, what the current installation looks like—and sounds like—depends on where you’re situated. Here’s one view:
music clip of the day 