can’t wait: Chicago Jazz Festival, 8/29-9/1
The Engines (9/1; Dave Rempis, saxophones, Jeb Bishop, trombone; Kent Kessler [filling in for Nate McBride], bass; Tim Daisy, drums), live, Columbia, South Carolina, 2013
#1
#2
Stevie Wonder with Prince, “Superstition” (S. Wonder), live, Paris, 2010
Not many stars would handle this the way Prince does. Actually, what’s most impressive is what he doesn’t do. Given a guitar solo, he doesn’t try to steal the show—or even draw attention. Instead, he feeds the groove.
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lagniappe
reading table
Sophistication is upscale conformity.
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What is more yours than what always holds you back?
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The heart is a small, cracked cup, easy to fill, impossible to keep full.
—James Richardson, “Even More Aphorisms and Ten-Second Essays from Vectors 3.0” (excerpts)
There are all kinds of blues, too.
Joe McPhee Survival Unit 3 (JM, alto saxophone; Fred Lonberg-Holm, cello; Michael Zerang, drums), live, London, 2010
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lagniappe
reading table
Dream Song 40
By John Berryman (1914-1972)I’m scared a lonely. Never see my son,
easy be not to see anyone,
combers out to sea
know they’re goin somewhere but not me.
Got a little poison, got a little gun,
I’m scared a lonely.I’m scared a only one thing, which is me,
from othering I don’t take nothin, see,
for any hound dog’s sake.
But this is where I livin, where I rake
my leaves and cop my promise, this’ where we
cry oursel’s awake.Wishin was dyin but I gotta make
it all this way to that bed on these feet
where peoples said to meet.
Maybe but even if I see my son
forever never, get back on the take,
free, black & forty-one.
Back in the ’70s, when I was in college, I heard John Berryman read his poetry, an experience that opened my ears and mind in all kinds of ways. He moved so swiftly, and gracefully, from one register to another, leaping back and forth between high and low as if nothing could be more natural. Today he joins a select group—tenor saxophonist Von Freeman, trumpeter Lester Bowie, singer Dorothy Love Coates, poets Wislawa Szymborska and William Bronk—in the MCOTD Hall of Fame.
More sounds from the shadows.
Evan Parker (tenor saxophone) and Ned Rothenberg (alto saxophone), live, Silver Spring, Md. (Sonic Circuits Festival of Experimental Music), 2009
If this dialogue were translated into English, how would it read?
last night
I heard these guys at a small Chicago club (Hideout)—what a storm.
Peter Brötzmann (reeds), Ken Vandermark (reeds), Hamid Drake (drums), Chad Taylor (drums), live, Slovenia (Ljubljana), 7/3/13
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
When our minds are filled with music, they’re free of everything else.
making a joyful noise
Evangelist Rosie Haynes (alto saxophone, vocals), “Because He Lives,” live, Milwaukee, 2005
#1
#2
*****
taking a break
I’m taking some time off—back in a while.
D’Angelo (with Questlove, drums; Pino Palladino, bass; Kuumba Frank Lacy, trombone, trumpet; Chalmers “Spanky” Alford, guitar; Anthony Hamilton, vocals, et al.), live, Switzerland (Montreux Jazz Festival), 2000
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
No stage anywhere in the world can compare with the one that exists in the imagination. Where else can you find Jimi Hendrix jamming with Miles Davis? Sam Cooke singing with Smokey Robinson? Sly Stone taking everybody higher with Sun Ra?
*****
Happy Birthday, Suzanne!
This is, to these ears, just perfect.
Sonny Rollins Trio (SR, tenor saxophone; Henry Grimes, bass; Pete La Roca, drums), “Weaver of Dreams,” live, Netherlands (Laren), 1959
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lagniappe
random thoughts
What will the world be like without you?
tonight
I’ll be at the Hideout, a small club on Chicago’s northwest side, seeing this Ethiopian dancer, this baritone saxophonist, and an array of other dancers and musicians.
Melaku Belay (dance), Ken Vandermark (baritone saxophone), Joe McPhee (alto saxophone), Milwaukee, 6/22/13
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lagniappe
reading table
wind blowing
paper fans rustling
rustling—Kobayashi Issa (1763-1827), 1823 (translated from Japanese by David G. Lanoue)
father and son
Brian Blade (drums) & The Fellowship Band, with Brady L. Blade Sr. (vocals), “Amazing Grace,” live, Savannah, Ga. (2012)
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lagniappe
reading table
Some things endure. When my sons, Alex and Luke, were in grade school, I started a two-person “reading group” with each of them. We would read novels together, maybe one a month, alternating choices, and go out and talk about them over a meal. Alex is now twenty-five. This morning we’re going out for breakfast, where we’ll be talking about a short story by Richard Yates, “Oh, Joseph, I’m So Tired.” Of stories there is no end.
When Franklin D. Roosevelt was President-elect there must have been sculptors all over America who wanted a chance to model his head from life, but my mother had connections.
—Richard Yates (1926-1992), “Oh, Joseph, I’m So Tired” (first sentence)
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