summer in the city
Blink-182, live, Chicago, 8/4/17
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lagniappe
reading table
John Ashbery (July 28, 1927-September, 3, 2017)
How little we know,
and when we know it!*****
We close in on ourselves,
then yelp that the world is awry.*****
We had macaroni for lunch every day
except Sunday, when a small quail was induced
to be served to us. Why do I tell you these things?
You are not even here.—”Like A Sentence,” “Tahiti Trot,” “This Room” (fragments)
another take
Morton Feldman (1927-1986; MCOTD Hall of Fame), Rothko Chapel (1971); Markus Creed (cond.), SWR Vokalensemble (Vocal Ensemble), et al., live, Germany (Cathedral of Speyer, Schwetzinger), 2017
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lagniappe
art beat: yesterday, Art Institute of Chicago
Paul Gauguin (1848-1903), Cup Decorated with the Figure of a Bathing Girl, 1887-88 (Gauguin: Artist as Alchemist, through September 10th)
*****
reading table
John Ashbery (July 28, 1927-September, 3, 2017)
What will it all be like in five years’ time
when you try to remember?—”For John Clare” (fragment)
soundtrack to a dream
John Luther Adams (1953-), The Light Within (2007); Faculty & Fellows, Bang on a Can Summer Music Festival at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, North Adams, Mass., 2016
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lagniappe
reading table
John Ashbery (July 28, 1927-September, 3, 2017)
The bad news is the ship hasn’t arrived;
the good news is it hasn’t left yet.—He Who Loves And Runs Away (fragment; Planisphere, 2009)
*****
random sights
this morning, Chicago (Columbus Park)
sounds of Amsterdam
Michael Vatcher, percussion (Angels’ Share, sculpture exhibition, Herbert Nouens; Westerpark, Sculpture Park), 2014
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lagniappe
reading table
John Ashbery, July 28, 1927-September, 3, 2017
Alcove (Planisphere, 2009)
Is it possible that spring could be
once more approaching? We forget each time
what a mindless business it is, porous like sleep,
adrift on the horizon, refusing to take sides, “mugwump
of the final hour,” lest an agenda—horrors!—be imputed to it,
and the whole point of its being spring collapse
like a hole dug in sand. It’s breathy, though,
you have to say that for it.And should further seasons coagulate
into years, like spilled, dried paint, why,
who’s to say we weren’t provident? We indeed
looked out for others as though they mattered, and they,
catching the spirit, came home with us, spent the night
in an alcove from which their breathing could be heard clearly.
But it’s not over yet. Terrible incidents happen
daily. That’s how we get around obstacles.
this weekend in Chicago
They’re playing, tomorrow afternoon, at the Chicago Jazz Festival.
Mary Halvorson Octet, “Away with You (No. 55),” live, New York, 2017
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lagniappe
reading table
The rain is less an atmospheric condition at this point than a kind of state of being, like mourning, that can’t be forgotten unless you’re asleep.
—Matt Pearce, “On the road in Texas, where all the roads look like rivers,” Los Angeles Times, 8/29/17
never enough
Frederic Chopin (1810-1849), Prelude No. 15 in D flat major (“Raindrop”); Friedrich Gulda (1930-2000), piano
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lagniappe
reading table
dragonfly—
flying two feet,
then two feet more—Kobayashi Issa, 1763-1827 (translated from Japanese by David G. Lanoue)
mysterious, adj. Exciting wonder, curiosity, or surprise while baffling efforts to comprehend or identify. E.g., Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s Sequences.
Anna Thorvaldsdottir (1977-), Sequences (bass flute, bass clarinet, baritone saxophone, contrabassoon), 2016; International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), live, New York, 2016
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lagniappe
reading table
in the big rain
gushing down
little butterfly—Kobayashi Issa, 1763-1827 (translated from Japanese by David G. Lanoue)
This piece, in over forty years of listening, has never—not once—let me down. And this performance, which I encountered last night, is among the strongest I’ve heard.
Johann Sebastian Bach, Suite No. 5 in C minor for Unaccompanied Cello
Mischa Maisky, live, 1991
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lagniappe
reading table
Unable are the Loved to die
For Love is Immortality,
Nay, it is Deity –Unable they that love – to die
For Love reforms Vitality
Into Divinity.—Emily Dickinson (1830-1886), 951 (Franklin)
sounds of Detroit
Pastor Marvin Winans (Perfecting Church, Detroit) and Perfecting Praise Choir, live, Toronto, 2011
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lagniappe
random sights
this morning, outside Chicago (Chicago Botanic Garden)
*****
reading table
Always Mine!
No more Vacation!
Term of Light this Day begun!
Failless as the fair rotation
Of the Seasons and the Sun –Old the Grace, but new the Subjects –
Old, indeed, the East,
Yet upon His Purple Programme
Every Dawn, is first.—Emily Dickinson (1830-1886), 942 (Franklin)
tonight in Chicago
He’s singing in Millenium Park.
Youssou N’Dour, “Lang,” live
*****
And they’re playing at Elastic.
Daniel Levin (cello) & Tim Daisy (drums), live, Bloomington, Ind., 2015
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lagniappe
reading table
The least misfortune can do to make up for itself is to be interesting.
—Michael Kinsley, Old Age: A Beginner’s Guide
music clip of the day 