music clip of the day

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Category: radio

2013

Thursday, July 4th

Happy 4th of July!

It’s easy, sometimes, to take even great blessings for granted, like, for instance, living within walking distance—yes, walking distance—of a wonderful club (FitzGerald’s), where, last night, at their annual American Music Festival (three stages, four days), now in its thirty-third year, I saw these folks.

Joe Hall & The Louisiana Cane Cutters, live, Louisiana (Breaux Bridge), 2009

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Sleepy LaBeef, “Strange Things Happening Every Day” (plus interview), TV show (Late Night with Conan O’Brien), 1994

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The Paladins, “Kiddeo,” live, Netherlands, 2007

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lagniappe

radio

Today, celebrating one of his birthdays (a long story), WKCR-FM (Columbia University) will be playing Louis Armstrong—and nothing but—all day.

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2013

Wednesday, June 19th

serendipity

Last night, while I was doing some law work, these guys—I’d never heard of them before—jumped out of the radio.*

Los Pirañas, “Bambo Ha Muerto Devorado Por El Pecado (Version Alterna),” live, Colombia (Bogotá), 2011


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lagniappe

reading table

I am not poor, I am not rich, nothing’s here but nothing’s lacking, I have little, I want nothing: all my treasure is in Minerva’s tower.

—Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621)

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*Give the Drummer Some (WFMU-FM [Give the Drummer Radio Stream] Tues., 6-7 p.m.; Fri., 9 a.m.-noon [EST]).

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2013

Friday, June 14th

Shivkumar Sharma (santoor) & Zakir Hussain (tabla), live, Tokyo, 1988

#1


#2


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lagniappe

radio

Today it’s all ragas all day at WKCR-FM (Columbia University), where they’re hosting the Ragas Live Festival—24 hours straight of Indian classical music, featuring 24 live in-studio performances.

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2013

Saturday, May 25th

sounds of Chicago

The Chosen Few Picnic, Jackson Park, 7/12


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lagniappe

radio

Beginning at 3 p.m. and going ’til midnight (EST), WFMU-FM will be featuring sounds from this weekend’s Primavera Sound Festival (Barcelona):

3:00 Swans
4:20 Orchestra Poly Rhythmo de Cotonou
4:50 Guardian Alien
5:30 Goat
6:00 Tinariwen
6:20 Mulatu Astatke
6:45 Death Grips
7:10 Thee Oh Sees
7:40 Meat Puppets
8:15 Dan Deacon
9:00 Jesus and Mary Chain
9:30 Dead Can Dance
10:00 Nurse With Wound
11:00 Omar Souleyman
11:30 Wu-Tang Clan

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taking a break

I’m taking some time off—back in a while.

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2013

Wednesday, May 8th

Yesterday, listening to WKCR-FM (Columbia University), I bumped into this, a track I never tired of hearing when, in the ’70s, I was in college.

Bill Evans (1929-1980), piano, “Never Let Me Go” (Alone, 1968)

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2013

Monday, April 29th

serendipity

Every so often, like, for instance, last night, when I was listening to the radio* while working on a brief for a client who’s serving a 20-year sentence for attempted murder, I find myself being totally swept away by something that, a minute earlier, I didn’t even know existed.

Pannalal Ghosh (1911-1960), bansuri (Indian flute), Raga Darbari

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lagniappe

random thoughts

One thing we can be sure of, in an otherwise uncertain world, is that each of us is a child of a God who may or may not exist.

*Raag Aur Taal, WKCR-FM (Columbia University).

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2013

Sunday, April 28th

more

George Jones (1931-2013), “Amazing Grace,” TV show, 2008


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lagniappe

radio

Today, beginning at 10 a.m. (EST), there’ll be a four-hour memorial broadcast on WKCR-FM (Columbia University). 

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2013

Monday, April 22nd

Let’s listen, after a week of bombings and explosions and earthquakes, to something spare, something quiet.

Erik Satie (1866-1925), Sonneries de la Rose + Croix – Air du Grand Prieur (1892); Reinbert de Leeuw, piano


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lagniappe

radio

Happy Birthday, Charles Mingus!

Today it’s all Mingus, all day at WKCR-FM (Columbia University).

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2013

Sunday, March 10th

Too much dough? Here’s a solution: the annual marathon fundraiser for WFMU-FM, arguably the best radio station in the world (maybe the universe).

Kevin Nutt, Sinner’s Crossroads, WFMU-FM (Thurs., 8-9 p.m. [EST]); Marathon Broadcast, 2009

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2013

Saturday, March 9th

Happy (83rd) Birthday, Ornette!

Ornette Coleman Quartet (OC, alto saxophone; Don Cherry, pocket trumpet; Charlie Haden, bass; Billy Higgins, drums), live, Spain (Barcelona), 1987

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lagniappe

musical thoughts

How can I turn emotion into knowledge? That’s what I try to do with my horn.

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It’s not that I reject categories. It’s that I don’t really know what categories are.

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You take the alphabet of the English language. A to Z. A symbol attached to a sound. In music you have what are called notes and the key. In life you’ve got an idea and an emotion. We think of them as different concepts. To me, there is no difference.

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The violin, the saxophone, the trumpet: Each makes a very different sound but the very same notes. That’s pretty heavy, you know? Imagine how many different races make up the human race. I’m called colored, you’re called white, he’s called something else. We still got an asshole and a mouth. Pardon me.

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I don’t try to please when I play. I try to cure.

—Ornette Coleman

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radio

All Ornette, all day: WKCR-FM (Columbia University).

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