Saturday, June 11th
There’s Amsterdam.
There’s Ethiopia.
And there’s Amsterdam in Ethiopia.
The Ex & Han Bennink (drums), Ethiopia, 2002
music clip of the day
jazz/blues/rock/classical/gospel/more
2016
Friday, June 10th
voices I miss
Albert Collins (1932-1993), live, Switzerland (Montreux), 1979
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lagniappe
art beat: other day, Art Institute of Chicago
Aaron Siskind (1903-1991), Chicago 28 1957 (Abstractions, through 8/14/16)
*****
tonight in Chicago
The Chicago Blues Festival celebrates the 45th anniversary of Alligator Records, where, in the ’70s, barely out of college, I had the good fortune to co-produce recordings by Albert Collins, Koko Taylor, Son Seals, Fenton Robinson, Jimmy Johnson, Carey Bell, et al.
2016
Thursday, June 9th
never enough
Two days ago I’d never heard of him; last night he took my breath away.
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), Partita No. 2 in D minor for Solo Violin, excerpt (Sarabande); Leonidas Kavakos, live, France (Annecy), 2015
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lagniappe
reading table
The Poets light but Lamps –
Themselves – go out –—Emily Dickinson (1830-1886), 930 (Franklin), fragment
2016
Wednesday, June 8th
sounds of New York
Lea Bertucci, “The Cepheid Variations,” live, New York, 2015
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
New sounds are heard in the dark.
2016
Tuesday, June 7th
like nobody else
Leroy Jenkins Gut Band (LJ [1932-2007] violin, compositions; Brandon Ross, guitar; David Wong, bass; Newman Taylor Baker, drums), live, New York, 2000
2016
Monday, June 6th
yesterday in Chicago
At the Art Institute—next to Millennium Park, site of Saturday’s Gospel Fest—I heard this piece for the first time, played by three Chicago-based musicians (violinist Yuan-Qing Yu, clarinetist J. Lawrie Bloom, pianist Adam Nieman). It, too, sang.
Charles Ives (1874-1954), Largo for Violin, Clarinet, Piano (1901-02); Lucy Chapman-Stoltzman (violin), Richard Stoltzman (clarinet), Richard Goode (piano), 1990
2016
Sunday, June 5th
yesterday in Chicago
I heard these folks in Millennium Park, at the thirty-first annual Gospel Fest. Rain had been falling, but it stopped. Slowly, dark skies gave way to sunshine.
Brian Courtney Wilson, “Just Love,” live, Windsor Village United Methodist Church, Houston, Tx.
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William Murphy, “It’s Working,” live, Newbirth Missionary Baptist Church, Lithonia, Ga.
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Shirley Caesar, “No Charge,” live
2016
Saturday, June 4th
what’s new
Beck, “Wow,” 6/2/16
2016
Friday, June 3rd
Mozart one day, another day this—how lucky to live in a world so various.
Konono No. 1, “Yaya Mikolo,” live, France (Saint-Nazaire), 2009
2016
Thursday, June 2nd
sounds of Chicago and Oslo
Ken Vandermark (tenor saxophone), Paal Nilssen-Love (percussion), “Song for Terrie,” live, Netherlands (Amsterdam), 5/26/16
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lagniappe
random sights
this morning, Oak Park, Ill.
*****
A big birthday shout-out to my brother Don, my first listening companion. All these years later, the basement jukebox still plays: “Wake Up Little Susie” (Everly Brothers) . . .”North to Alaska” (Johnny Horton) . . .”(The Man Who Shot) Liberty Valance” (Gene Pitney) . . . Hear it?
music clip of the day 