mesmerizing
If I could move like this, I’d never stand still.
Dormeshia Sumbry-Edwards (1976-), live, Stockholm, 2013
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Chicago (Columbus Park)
*****
reading table
Topography displays no favorites; North’s as near as West.
—Elizabeth Bishop (1911-1979), from “The Map”
like nobody else
Nina Simone (1933-2003, vocals, piano), “Wild Is the Wind” (D. Tiomkin, N. Washington), live, New York, 1964
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Oak Park, Ill.
*****
reading table
The challenge: balance. Keep it steady,
now sniffing daffodils’ aroma,
now Googling a rare sarcoma.—Rachel Hadas (1948-), from “Love and Dread” (New Yorker, 11/18/19)
sounds of Kinshasa
KOKOKO!, “Likolo,” “Tongos’a,” “Malembe,” live, Washington, D.C., 11/15/19
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Forest Park, Ill.
*****
reading table
Many nights on the road
and not dead yet—
the end of autumn.—Matsuo Basho (1644-1694), translated from Japanese by Robert Hass
sounds of New York
Why not begin the week with something new?
Jason Kao Hwang’s Sing House (JKH, violin, viola, compositions; Kalun Leung, trombone; Christopher Forbes, piano; Ken Filiano, bass; Andrew Drury, drums), live, New York, 9/29/19
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Oak Park, Ill.
*****
reading table
not grown to a butterfly
this late in autumn
a caterpillar—Matsuo Basho (1644-1694), translated from Japanese by Makoto Ueda
next week in Chicago
She’s performing Monday at the Chicago Cultural Center.
Caterina Barbieri (modular synthesizer), live, Italy (Genoa), 2015
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lagniappe
random sights
a while ago, Ireland (Dingle Peninsula)
*****
reading table
I’ve always been aware of being an inconsistent personality. Of having a lot of contradictory voices knocking around my head. As a kid, I was ashamed of it. Other people seemed to feel strongly about themselves, to know exactly who they were. I was never like that. I could never shake the suspicion that everything about me was the consequence of a series of improbable accidents—not least of which was the 400 trillion–to-one accident of my birth. As I saw it, even my strongest feelings and convictions might easily be otherwise, had I been the child of the next family down the hall, or the child of another century, another country, another God.
—Zadie Smith, “Fascinated to Presume: In Defense of Fiction,” New York Review of Books, 10/24/19
sounds of Haiti and Chicago
Nathalie Joachim (vocals, electronics) with Spektral Quartet, “Papa Loco” (trad.), live (studio), New York, published 10/29/19
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lagniappe
random sights
yesterday, Oak Park, Ill.
*****
reading table
She cries. Oh no. Oh no no no.
—Eimear McBride, A Girl Is a Half-Formed Thing
what’s new
Big Thief, “Not,” live (TV show), 10/10/19
*****
Another take.
Recording, published 8/13/19
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Oak Park, Ill.
*****
reading table
Tread very gingerly; you’ve used up almost all the words.
—Lucie Brock-Broido (1956-2018), from “Lucid Interval”
back to church
Swanee Quintet, live, 2017
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lagniappe
random sights
this morning, Oak Park, Ill.
*****
reading table
In the summer of 1948, chance deposited my wife and me in the bleachers of a tiny one-ring circus playing under a tent on the outskirts of Florence.
—William Maxwell (1908-2000), The Outermost Dream
sounds of Ukraine
When you live in a country where words seem to mean less and less, what a relief it can be to listen to a language you know not at all.
Alyona Alyona, live (acoustic session), Slovakia (Pohoda Festival), 2019
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lagniappe
random sights
yesterday, Oak Park, Ill.
never enough
Bela Bartok (1881-1945), String Quartet No. 4 in C major (1928); Quatuor Ebène, live, France (Wissembourg), 2013
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lagniappe
random sights
yesterday, Oak Park, Ill.
*****
reading table
Domestic as
an empty shopping cart
parked on a ledge
above a freeway.—Rae Armantrout (1947-), from “Hang On” (New Yorker, 10/21/19)
