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Category: hard-to-peg

Thursday, February 28th

serendipity

Something I just bumped into.

Trio WAZ (Ed Wilkerson, tenor saxophone; Tatsu Aoki, bass; Michael Zerang, drums), live, Michigan (Lakeside, concert presented by Portoluz), 2010


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lagniappe

musical thoughts

Color.

Texture.

Density.

Sometimes they’re more important than melody, or harmony, or rhythm.

*****

reading table

“The Snow Man”
by Wallace Stevens (1879-1955)

One must have a mind of winter
To regard the frost and the boughs
Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;

And have been cold a long time
To behold the junipers shagged with ice,
The spruces rough in the distant glitter

Of the January sun; and not to think
Of any misery in the sound of the wind,
In the sound of a few leaves,

Which is the sound of the land
Full of the same wind
That is blowing in the same bare place

For the listener, who listens in the snow,
And, nothing himself, beholds
Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

Tuesday, February 26th

keep on dancing

Moodymann (AKA Moody), “Anotha Black Sunday” (2009)


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lagniappe

random thoughts

One benefit of getting older, I’ve found, is that you develop a keener appreciation for just how much you have to be humble about.

Saturday, February 23rd

This seems, somehow, to these ears, anyway, to fit a day when the ashes of my mother-in-law are being buried.

Revolutionary Ensemble (Leroy Jenkins, violin; Sirone, bass; Jerome Cooper, drums), “Chicago” (Live at Moosham Castle, 1977)

Wednesday, February 20th

basement jukebox

Magic Sam (AKA Samuel Maghett, 1937-1969), Cobra Records, Chicago

“All Your Love,” 1957

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“Love Me with a Feeling,” 1957

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“Everything Gonna Be Alright,” 1958

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“21 Days In Jail,” 1958

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taking a break

I’m taking some time off—back soon.

Friday, February 15th

a week in New Orleans: day five

Big Freedia

“Na Who Mad,” 2011


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Talking, walking around town, performing, etc.
Pitchfork TV, 2013

Thursday, February 14th

a week in New Orleans: day four

Mardi Gras Indians (Fat Tuesday, 2012)

Wild Magnolias


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Two Indian Tribes Meet in Treme

Tuesday, February 12th

a week in New Orleans: day two 

Bon Mardi Gras

Professor Longhair, December 19, 1918-January 30, 1980

“Mardi Gras in New Orleans” (AKA “Go to the Mardi Gras”), 1950


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“Big Chief”


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“Tipitina” (with the Meters)

Monday, February 11th

a week in New Orleans: day one

In no other city are the streets so musical.

Treme Sidewalk Steppers Second Line, 2/1/09

Rebirth Brass Band, “It’s All Over Now” (B. Womack & S. Womack)


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Kevin Harris (tenor saxophone) & other Sixth Ward musicians


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lagniappe

This is a city, too, for stylin’ dogs.

Barkus Mardi Gras Parade, 1/27/13

Wednesday, February 6th

alone

Hamid Drake, drums, Paris, 2010


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lagniappe

reading table

Last night I completed a long, meandering journey I began several years ago, finishing the last of the seven volumes of Marcel Proust’s In Search of Lost Time. If you’ve ever thought about making this trip yourself, I have just one word of advice: go. The minutes, and hours, I’ve spent in Proust’s company—often just a few pages at a time—are among the most rewarding, and pleasurable, I’ve had.

*****

One, two, three. Time, time!

—William Shakespeare, Cymbeline (II, 2, 51)

Tuesday, February 5th

serendipity

This guy I stumbled upon yesterday afternoon, listening to the radio.* It had been a hard weekend; my 88-year-old mother-in-law died Saturday. These were just the sounds I needed, though I didn’t realize it—spare, precise, open.

Jesse Stacken Trio,** “Bagatelle No. 4,” recording session (Bagatelles for Trio, 2012)

*WFMU-FM (Give the Drummer Radio, webstream), Destination: Out.

**JS, piano; Eivind Opsvik, bass; Jeff Davis, drums.