Monday, May 1st
two takes
Thelonious Monk (1917-1982), “Hackensack”
Anat Fort, live, Israel (Tel Aviv), 2015
***
Thelonious Monk Quartet (TM, piano; Charlie Rouse, tenor saxophone; Larry Gayle, bass; Ben Riley, drums), live (TV show), London, 1965
music clip of the day
jazz/blues/rock/classical/gospel/more
Category: saxophone
2017
2017
Tuesday, April 11th
more
John Coltrane Quartet (JC, tenor saxophone; McCoy Tyner, piano; Jimmy Garrison, bass; Elvin Jones, drums), “Vigil,” “Naima,” “My Favorite Things,” live, Belgium (Comblain-La-Tour), 1965
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lagniappe
art beat
Robert Frank (1924-), Cafe – Beaufort, South Carolina, 1955
2017
Tuesday, March 28th
bad news/good news
Bad news: You’ve heard nothing this good in who knows how long.
Good news: You’re about to hear this.
Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers (AB, drums; John Gilmore, tenor saxophone; Lee Morgan, trumpet; John Hicks, piano; Victor Sproles, bass), “On The Ginza,” “Lament for Stacey,” “The Egyptian,” “I Can’t Get Started,” “Buhaina’s Delight,” live (TV show), London, 1964
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lagniappe
art beat
Robert Frank (1924-), Rooming house—Bunker Hill, Los Angeles, 1955/56
2017
Thursday, March 23rd
Soundtrack for a man in a box trying to escape.
Ab Baars (tenor saxophone), “Asor,” live, Amsterdam, 2014
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lagniappe
reading table
I thought that you were an anchor in the drift of the world;
but no: there isn’t an anchor anywhere.
There isn’t an anchor in the drift of the world. Oh no.
I thought you were. Oh no. The drift of the world.—William Bronk (1918-1999, MCOTD Hall of Fame), “The World”
2017
Thursday, March 9th
MCOTD Hall of Fame
William Parker’s In Order To Survive (WP, bass, composition; Hamid Drake, drums, MCOTD Hall of Fame;* Lewis Barnes, trumpet; Rob Brown, alto saxophone; Cooper-Moore, piano), “Criminals in the White House,” live, New York, 2013
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lagniappe
radio
Today—his birthday—it’s all Ornette Coleman all day on WKCR-FM (Columbia University).
*****
*With saxophonists Von Freeman and Henry Threadgill; trumpeter Lester Bowie; gospel singer Dorothy Love Coates; composer Morton Feldman; poets John Berryman, William Bronk, and Wislawa Szymborska; and photographer Helen Levitt.
2017
Thursday, February 9th
what’s new
Craig Taborn, Daylight Ghosts, 2017
The other day I bumped into this guy in New York, at The Guggenheim, where we were both seeing the Agnes Martin exhibit. We talked for a moment—I told him how much I like his music. Then our eyes went back to the paintings.
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lagniappe
art beat: other day, The Guggenheim (New York)
Agnes Martin (1912-2004), Happy Holiday, 1999
2017
Sunday, January 22nd
back to church
Post-inaugural blues?
Try this.
First Church of Deliverance Choir, “Afterwhile It’ll All Be Over,” live, Chicago
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, New York (High Line)
*****
my back pages
On a cold, snowy night forty years ago, at a church outside Chicago, my wife, Suzanne, and I were married. Tenor saxophonist Von Freeman (MCOTD Hall of Fame) and pianist John Young, both now gone, performed at the ceremony. All of what they played that night—”Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” “It Never Entered My Mind,” “More” (before); “In a Sentimental Mood” (unaccompanied saxophone, as the bride walked down the aisle); “My Favorite Things,” “Song for My Father” (after)—can be heard here (0:15-).
2017
Wednesday, January 18th
sounds of New York
Aaron Burnett’s Big Machine (AB, tenor saxophone, compositions; Peter Evans, trumpet, Carlos Homs, piano; Nicholas Joswiak, bass; Tyshawn Sorey, drums), live, New York, 11/30/16
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lagniappe
art beat: other day, The Guggenheim (New York)
Vasily Kandinsky (1866-1944), Painting with White Border, 1913
2017
Saturday, January 7th
two takes
“What a Wonderful World” (B. Thiele & G.D. Weiss)
George Adams (1940-1992; tenor saxophone) & Don Pullen (1941-1995; piano), live, Japan (Mt. Fuji Jazz Festival), 1989
***
Louis Armstrong (1901-1971), live (TV show), England, 1967
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lagniappe
random sights
this morning, Chicago (Columbus Park)
*****
what we’re about to lose
Michelle Obama, speaking to a gathering of school counselors at the White House (excerpt), yesterday
Our glorious diversity—our diversities of faiths, and colors, and creeds—that is not a threat to who we are; it makes us who we are.
2017
Friday, January 6th
sounds of New York
What other drummer does so much with so little?
Paul Motian Trio (PM, drums; Joe Lovano, tenor saxophone; Bill Frisell, guitar), “It Should’ve Happened a Long Time Ago” (P. Motian), live, New York, 2005
music clip of the day 