spring!
Blossom Dearie (1924-2009; vocals, piano), “They Say It’s Spring” (M. Clark, B. Haymes), 1958
*****
Bob Dorough (1923-2018; vocals, piano), “Spring Can Really Hang You Up the Most” (T. Wolf, F. Landesman), 1997
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Sun Ra Arkestra (SR, 1914-1993, piano, composition; June Tyson, vocals; John Gilmore, tenor saxophone, et al.), “Springtime Again,” live, Rome, 1980
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lagniappe
random sights
yesterday, Chicago
what’s new
Mogwai, live, Scotland (Glasgow), published 3/18/21
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Oak Park, Ill.
*****
reading table
Spring and All
by William Carlos Williams (1883-1963)
By the road to the contagious hospital
under the surge of the blue
mottled clouds driven from the
northeast—a cold wind. Beyond, the
waste of broad, muddy fields
brown with dried weeds, standing and fallen
patches of standing water
the scattering of tall trees
All along the road the reddish
purplish, forked, upstanding, twiggy
stuff of bushes and small trees
with dead, brown leaves under them
leafless vines—
Lifeless in appearance,
sluggish dazed spring approaches—
They enter the new world naked,
cold, uncertain of all
save that they enter. All about them
the cold, familiar wind—
Now the grass, tomorrow
the stiff curl of wildcarrot leaf
One by one objects are defined—
It quickens: clarity, outline of leaf
But now the stark dignity of
entrance—Still, the profound change
has come upon them: rooted, they
grip down and begin to awaken
alone
Thelonious Monk (1917-1982, piano), “‘Round Midnight” (T. Monk), 1954
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Chicago
sounds of India
This I could listen to all day.
Sashank Subramanyam and Rakesh Chaurasia (flutes), Anubrata Chatterjee (tabla), Patri Satish Kumar (mridangam), live (Rag Hamsadwani), India (Velliangiri Hills), 2014
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lagniappe
random sights
yesterday, Oak Park, Ill.
*****
reading table
Not yet disappeared
like a dewdrop
on a blade of grass,
I am still in this floating world,
moon in the morning.—Ryokan (1758-1831), translated from Japanese by Kazuaki Tanahashi
Another take on piano and strings.
Alfred Schnittke (1934-98), Piano Quintet (1972-76), live (Katya Apekisheva, piano; Boris Brovtsyn, Julia-Maria Kretz, violins; Amihai Grosz, viola; Torleif Thedéen, cello), Netherlands (Utrecht), 2010
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Chicago
Suppose that, for the rest of your life, you could listen to only one piece of music. What would you choose? For me it might be this.
Morton Feldman (1926-1987; MCOTD Hall of Fame), Piano and String Quartet (1985); Kronos Quartet with Aki Takahashi (piano), 1993
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lagniappe
art beat: other day, Art Institute of Chicago
Jackson Pollock (1912-1956), Number 17A, 1948 (detail)
sounds of Chicago
Gospel Songbirds (featuring Otis Clay [1942-2016], 1:55-), “Help Me Run This Race,” live (TV show [Jubilee Showcase]), Chicago, 1964
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lagniappe
art beat: other day, Art Institute of Chicago
Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890), Grapes, Lemons, Pears, and Apples, 1887 (detail)
*****
reading table
He walks on, northwards, toward the snow
and things unseen, unknown.
Slowly the imperfect cities’ sounds grow still,
only streams hold forth chaotically
while white clouds play at nothingness.
He hears an oriole’s song, delicate,
uncertain, like a prayer, like weeping.—Adam Zagajewski (1945-), from “The Great Poet Basho Begins His Journey,” translated from Polish by Clare Cavanagh (The Threepenny Review, Spring, 2021)
sounds of Paris
Ensemble Intercontemporain (Matthias Pintscher, direction), live, Paris, 11/14/20: Edgard Varèse (1883-1965), Octandre (1924); Marko Nikodijevic (1980-), music box/selbstportrait mit ligeti und strawinsky (und messiaen ist auch dabei) (2003/rev. 2006)
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lagniappe
random sights
this morning, outside Chicago (Salt Creek Trail)
sounds of South Africa
Black Coffee (DJ), live (“You Rock My World” [feat. Soulstar], “Flava” [feat. Una Rams and Tellaman], “Wish You Were Here” [feat. Msaki]), South Africa (Johannesburg), published 3/11/21
like nobody else
Lou Harrison (1917-2003), Concerto for Violin with Percussion Orchestra (1959); Todd Reynolds (violin), Third Coast Percussion, John Corkill (percussion), 2018
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lagniappe
random sights
yesterday, Oak Park, Ill.
*****
reading table
I’d have to be really quick
to describe clouds—
a split second’s enough
for them to start being something else.— Wislawa Szymborska (1923-2012, MCOTD Hall of Fame), from “Clouds” (translated from Polish by Clare Cavanagh and Stanislaw Baranczak)
music clip of the day 