sounds of New York (day one)
Tamio Shiraishi, live, New York, 10/12/14
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lagniappe
reading table
Even in Kyoto—
hearing the cuckoo’s cry—
I long for Kyoto.—Matsuo Basho (1644-1694; translated from Japanese by Robert Hass)
If I wanted to listen in on a conversation in a language I already know, I could go to Starbucks.
Christian Wolff (1934-), Pulse (1998); Jens Bracher (trumpet) & Julian Belli (percussion), live, Germany (Mannheim), 2011
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lagniappe
reading table
The Idea
by Mark Strand (April 11, 1934-November 29, 2014)For us, too, there was a wish to possess
Something beyond the world we knew, beyond ourselves,
Beyond our power to imagine, something nevertheless
In which we might see ourselves; and this desire
Came always in passing, in waning light, and in such cold
That ice on the valley’s lakes cracked and rolled,
And blowing snow covered what earth we saw,
And scenes from the past, when they surfaced again,
Looked not as they had, but ghostly and white
Among false curves and hidden erasures;
And never once did we feel we were close
Until the night wind said, “Why do this,
Especially now? Go back to the place you belong;”
And there appeared , with its windows glowing, small,
In the distance, in the frozen reaches, a cabin;
And we stood before it, amazed at its being there,
And would have gone forward and opened the door,
And stepped into the glow and warmed ourselves there,
But that it was ours by not being ours,
And should remain empty. That was the idea.
passings
Bunny Briggs, tap dancer, February 26, 1922-November 15, 2014
Duke Ellington Orchestra with Bunny Briggs (dance) and Jon Hendricks (vocal), “David Danced Before the Lord with All His Might,” live (A Concert of Sacred Music), San Francisco (Grace Cathedral), 1965
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And David danced before the Lord with all his might . . .
—2 Samuel 6:14 (King James)
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lagniappe
art beat
Robert Frank (1924-), Funeral—St. Helena, South Carolina, 1955
alone
Tashi Dorji, live (WFMU performance space), Jersey City, N.J., 9/7/14
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lagniappe
reading table
‘Like manufacturers’ instructions. In case of failure, try words.’
—Penelope Fitzgerald, Offshore
only rock ‘n’ roll
Couldn’t make it to Paris? (Me neither.)
St. Vincent, live, Paris, 10/31/14
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lagniappe
reading table
Most of the time I think of the self as a snare, and I don’t like being trapped in it. I try to reach out beyond my pittance of experience and connect to the world, but it turns out one way to do that is to be honest and accurate about my own life. I’m not convinced the personal is all that unique, anyway. It sometimes seems immoderate to claim really exceptional personal experiences, even though some of those experiences, particularly the painful ones, leave you with the worst feelings of isolation, feelings that have all the character of an absolutely individual, completely unprecedented experience—but you always find out that you aren’t alone. There are others, lots of others.
—Charles D’Ambrosio, email interview, New Yorker blog, 11/26/14
And thankful I am for the sounds of New Orleans, a city both real and unimaginable.
James Booker (1939-1983), “Classified” (J. Booker), live
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lagniappe
art beat
Michael P. Smith (1937-2008), Funeral of Emile Victor Clay, New Orleans, 1996
Thankful I am, too, for the unruly pleasures of rock ‘n’ roll.
Flamin’ Groovies, “Shake Some Action,” 1976
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
The story told in “Shake Some Action” is complete in its title—though in the song it’s a wish, not a fact, a desperate wish the singer doesn’t expect to come true. The words hardly matter: “Need” “Speed” “Say” “Away” are enough. It starts fast, as if in the middle of some greater song. A bright, trebly guitar counts off a theme, a beat is set, a bass note seems to explode, sending a shower of light over all the notes around it. The rhythm is pushing, but somehow it’s falling behind the singer. He slows down to let it catch up, and then the sound the guitar is making, a bell chiming through the day, has shot past both sides. Every beat is pulling back against every other; the whole song is a backbeat, every swing a backhand, every player his own free country, discovering the real free county in the song as it rises up in front of him, glimpsing that golden land, losing it as the mirage fades, blinking his eyes, getting it back, losing it again—that is its reckless abandon, the willingness of the music, in pursuit of where it needs to go, where it must go, to abandon itself.
—Greil Marcus, The History of Rock ‘n’ Roll in Ten Songs (2014)
Thankful I am, two days before Thanksgiving, for things that sound unlike anything I’ve ever heard before.
Horatiu Radulescu (1942-2008), String Quartet No. 5 (“before the universe was born”); JACK Quartet, live, Los Angeles, 2011
Why not begin the week with something beautiful?
John Cage (1912-1992), In a Landscape (1948); Shira Legmann (piano), live, Boston
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lagniappe
reading table
Winter garden,
the moon thinned to a thread,
insects singing.—Matsuo Basho (1644-1694; translated from Japanese by Robert Hass)
Back to church.
Whitney Houston (1963-2012), “God Will Take Care of You,” live (11:35-16:35), Evangelical Fellowship Church (Dr. Fred Jenkins Jr.), Pleasantville, N.J., 1998
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lagniappe
art beat
Helen Levitt (1913-2009), New York, 1980
music clip of the day 