Friday, January 23rd
More reasons to wonder: Where would we be without the saxophone?
Collective Identity Saxophone Quartet (Alex Harding, baritone; Jorge Sylvester & Bruce Williams, alto; Sam Newsome, soprano), live, New York, 10/11/14
music clip of the day
jazz/blues/rock/classical/gospel/more
2015
Thursday, January 22nd
my back pages
On this date in 1977, at a church thirty miles north of Chicago, amidst the cold and the snow and the dark, tenor saxophonist Von Freeman (1923-2012), a MCOTD Hall-of-Famer, played for a wedding. He was accompanied by pianist John Young (1922-2008). Here is how they sounded that night, as people were entering the church (0:15-, “Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” “It Never Entered My Mind,” “More”), as the bride walked down the aisle (8:00-, “In a Sentimental Mood”), and as folks were leaving (10:20-, “My Favorite Things,” “Song for My Father”).
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Von Freeman
2015
Wednesday, January 21st
Open Minds: Chris Potter Underground (with CP, tenor saxophone, bass clarinet; Craig Taborn, keyboards; Adam Rogers, guitar; Nate Smith, drums), 2012
Music documentaries can go wrong in so many ways. Too much talk. Talk that reminds you, repeatedly, why musicians aren’t paid to speak. Mediocre sound. This one, which I bumped into yesterday, seems to avoid them all.
2015
Tuesday, January 20th
Need a jolt?
Brandon Lopez (bass), Tyshawn Sorey (drums), Chris Pitsiokos (alto saxophone), live, New York, 11/10/14
Talk about range. The piece we heard Saturday—the one with flute, violin, bass clarinet, and piano? It was composed by the drummer.
2015
Monday, January 19th
He didn’t just speak—he sang.
Martin Luther King Jr., “I Have a Dream” (excerpt)
Washington, D.C., August 28, 1963
*****
Interview with MLK adviser and speechwriter Clarence B. Jones, 2013
2015
Sunday, January 18th
more of Archie B.
Five Blind Boys of Mississippi (feat. Archie Brownlee [1925-1960], lead vocals)
“Will My Jesus Be Waiting,” 1952
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“Where There’s a Will,” 1958
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“That Awful Hour,” 1960
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“Take Your Burdens to Jesus,” 1959
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lagniappe
reading table
Life shoots you a lethal dose of time. Time is a drug that wears off.
—Samantha Harvey, Dear Thief
2015
Saturday, January 17th
If your appetite for new music is insatiable, what better time to be alive?
Tyshawn Sorey (1980-), Quartet for Butch Morris (2012); International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), featuring Erik Carlson (violin); Joshua Rubin (bass clarinet), Eric Lamb (flute), Cory Smythe (piano); live, New York, 2012
Six decades of listening and, until yesterday, I’d never heard this particular combination of instruments. You?
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lagniappe
art beat: yesterday at the Art Institute of Chicago
James Ensor (1860-1949), Rooftops of Ostend, 1884 (Temptation: The Demons of James Ensor, through January 25th)
*****
reading table
Nature, the sky above us, is conducting no mean politics when it presents beauty to all, without discrimination, and nothing old and defective, but fresh and most tasty.
—Robert Walser (1878-1956), “Snowdrops,” excerpt (translated from German by Tom Whalen and Trudi Anderegg)
2015
Friday, January 16th
How many of today’s songs will people want to hear in 2078?
Hank Williams (1923-1953), live (TV show), 1952
“Cold, Cold Heart”
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“I Can’t Help It If I’m Still in Love with You” (with Anita Carter)
2015
Thursday, January 15th
basement jukebox
Kitty Wells (1919-2012), “Will Your Lawyer Talk to God” (H. Howard), 1962
2015
Wednesday, January 14th
sounds of Chicago (day two)
Sometimes encountering a new piece of music can turn your whole day around, which is what happened to me the other day when I bumped into this.
Georg Friedrich Haas (1953-), In Vain (2000)
Ensemble Dal Niente, live, Chicago, 2013
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lagniappe
art beat: yesterday at the Art Institute of Chicago
Claude Monet (1840-1926), Cliff Walk at Pourville (1882)
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Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841-1919), Seascape (1879)
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random thoughts
Eyes taste paintings no less than mouths taste food.
music clip of the day 