music clip of the day

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Category: piano

Monday, 12/3/12

old stuff

Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, Jeni LeGon, Fats Waller, “Living in a Great Big Way” (Hooray for Love, 1935)

Thursday, 11/29/12

riveting

Alexander Scriabin, Etude in D-sharp minor, Op. 8, No. 12 (1894)
Vladimir Horowitz, live, New York (Carnegie Hall), 1968

Wednesday, 11/28/12

enchanted forest

Bobo Stenson Trio (BS, piano; Anders Jormin, bass; Jon Fält, drums), “Olivia,” Sweden, 2009

Monday, 11/26/12

old stuff

Close your eyes and you’re there—one hand a martini, cigarette the other.

Fats Waller and his Rhythm, live radio broadcast
Yacht Club, 66 W. 52nd St., New York, 1938

Sunday, 11/25/12

Sometimes you can’t help but shout (3:05-).

Rev. James Cleveland and the Southern California Community Choir (with guest Albertina Walker), live, Chicago, 1972*

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lagniappe

random thoughts

Life isn’t short. It isn’t long, either. It’s nothing more, or less, than a series of moments, each beyond measure.

*****

*That same year Rev. Cleveland and his choir backed Aretha Franklin on Amazing Grace.

Saturday, 11/24/12

Happy 100th Birthday, Teddy!

Teddy Wilson, pianist, November 24, 1912-July 31, 1986

“Rosetta,” 1934

***

“Body and Soul,” with the Benny Goodman Trio (BG, clarinet; TW, piano; Gene Krupa, drums), 1935

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“Foolin’ Myself,” Teddy Wilson Orchestra (TW, piano; Billie Holiday, vocals; Lester Young, tenor saxophone; Freddie Green, guitar; Jo Jones, drums, et al.), 1937

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lagniappe

radio

WKCR-FM’s celebration of his centennial, which I mentioned the other day, runs through midnight Sunday.

*****

musical thoughts

John Cage (whose centennial we recently celebrated), Conlon Nancarrow (ditto), Teddy Wilson—they’d make a helluva band.

Friday, 11/23/12

Chicago: 1974 

“Muddy Waters Blues Summit in Chicago,”* Soundstage, 1974

*Muddy Waters, Junior Wells, Pinetop Perkins, Koko Taylor, Mike Bloomfield, Johnny Winter, Dr. John, et al.

Thursday, 11/22/12

otherworldly

Maurice Ravel, Jeux d’eau (1901)

Martha Argerich, live (1977)

*****

Alfred Cortot, recording (1920)

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lagniappe

radio

After finishing, at midnight, their 24-hour Coleman Hawkins birthday celebration, the indefatigable folks at WKCR-FM didn’t rest for even a minute. Instead they embarked on a 4-day, 96-hour celebration of pianist Teddy Wilson’s centennial.

*****

Happy Thanksgiving!

MCOTD gives thanks for

Lester Bowie and

Blossom Dearie and

The Dirtbombs;

for Mingus, Miles, Monk,

Bach, Beethoven, Bruckner, Bartok;

for WKCR-FM and WFMU-FM;

for Morton Feldman and

Elliott Carter and

Alfred Schnittke and

Tristan Murail;

for Hound Dog Taylor, Junior Wells, Sonny Boy Williamson, Magic Sam;

for The Ex, The Heptones, The Swan Silvertones, The Impressions, The Art Ensemble of Chicago;

for Von Freeman and Art Pepper and Vernard Johnson;

for Friedrich Gulda and Martha Argerich, Pierre-Laurent Aimard and Ursula Oppens;

for Ed Blackwell and

for Phillip Wilson;

for Julius Hemphill and

Henry Threadgill and

D’Angelo and

Dorothy Love Coates;

and for all the others—singers, musicians, composers, painters, photographers, printmakers, novelists, poets—who have graced this site;

and for you, who have found your way here, somehow, from Mongolia and Slovenia and Jamaica and Saudi Arabia; from Myanmar and Syria; from Angola, India, Ethiopia; from Finland, Thailand, Ireland, Iceland, and over 100 other countries.

Tuesday, 11/13/12

passings

Ted Curson, trumpeter, composer, June 3, 1935-November 4, 2012

“L.S.D. Takes a Holiday” (T. Curson), live, Paris, 1973

******

With Charles Mingus, “Better Git Hit In Your Soul,” Mingus at Antibes (recorded live 1960)*

*****

“Tears for Dolphy” (T. Curson), 1964

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*CM (bass, piano), Ted Curson (trumpet), Eric Dolphy (alto saxophone), Booker Ervin (tenor saxophone), Dannie Richmond (drums).

Saturday, 11/10/12

Last Sunday I had one of the great musical afternoons—one of the great afternoons, period—of my life, listening, at Chicago’s Symphony Center (across from the Art Institute), to pianist Andras Schiff play Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier, Book II, in its entirety (and entirely from memory), a performance that lasted nearly three hours and could’ve kept going, as far as I was concerned, for three days.

Johann Sebastian Bach, The Well-Tempered Clavier (1722 [Book I], 1742 [Book II])

Book II, Prelude and Fugue No. 16 in G minor, BMV 885
Sheng Cai (piano), live, Boston, 2010

*****

Books I and II, Sviatoslav Richter (piano), recording, 1970s

(For better sound quality on this and other YouTube clips, go to the “Settings” icon [lower right] and select the highest available [here 1080p].)

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lagniappe

musical thoughts

If there is anyone who owes everything to Bach, it is God. Without Bach, God would be a third-rate character.

Emil Cioran