never enough
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), Goldberg Variations, excerpts; Gideon Van Canneyt (marimba) and Silas Van den Spiegel (marimba), live, Koninklijk Conservatorium (Royal Conservatory of Brussels), Brussels, Belgium, 2020
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, outside Chicago
timeless
Milton Babbitt (1916-2011), Composition for 12 instruments (1948, rev. 1954; Ralph Shapey [1921-2002], cond.)
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Chicago
like nothing else
“Old Man Dancing” (Carla Bley, 1936-): Chet Doxas (clarinet, tenor saxophone), Carla Bley (piano), Karen Mantler (keyboard), Steve Swallow (bass), 2020
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lagniappe
random sights
yesterday, Oak Park, Ill.
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reading table
This is the point in prefaces where I customarily say something nice about my wife. This time, however, I can’t think of anything that even comes anywhere near doing her justice. Her name is Susan Patek Booth.
Berkeley, California
May 3, 1997—Stephen Booth (1933-2020), from Precious Nonsense: The Gettysburg Address, Ben Jonson’s Epitaphs on His Children, and Twelfth Night (1998)
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radio
Today, Thelonious Monk’s birthday, it’s all Monk, all day at WKCR (Columbia University).
back to church
“My Soul Is a Witness for My Lord,” Mt. Ramah Primitive Baptist Association, Thomaston, Georgia, 2011
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lagniappe
random sights
yesterday, Oak Park, Ill. (Oak Park Conservatory)
timeless
Morton Feldman (1926-1987, MCOTD Hall of Fame), Crippled Symmetry (1983); Ives Ensemble (Rik Andriessen, flute, bass flute; Arnold Marinissen, vibraphone, glockenspiel; John Snijders, piano, celesta), live, Amsterdam (Netherlands), 2008
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lagniappe
random sights
yesterday, Chicago
sounds of Ukraine
Alyona Alyona & Jerry Heil & Ginger Mane, “Зозуля,” published today
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lagniappe
random sights
yesterday, Chicago
timeless
This clip, which I bumped into the other day, may be the best I have ever seen of an artist whose music means as much to me as anyone’s.
Thelonious Monk (1917-1982, piano, compositions) with Charlie Rouse (tenor saxophone), Butch Warren (b), Frankie Dunlop (drums), live (TV show: “Evidence,” “Blue Monk,” Just a Gigolo” [L. Casucci, J. Brammer, I. Caesar], “Ba-Lue Bolivar Ba-Lues,” “Epistrophy”), Tokyo (Japan), 1963
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Oak Park, Ill.
never enough
Sometimes, as happened yesterday when I stumbled upon this, music increases the amount of available oxygen.
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book II, excerpt (Prelude and Fugue No. 3 in C-sharp major); Christine Schornsheim (harpsichord), published 10/4/22
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lagniappe
reading table
We are here to listen.
—W. S. Graham (1918-1986), from “The Greenock Dialogues”
alone (another take)
Lukas Ligeti (1965-), “Thinking Songs” (2015); Ji Hye Jung (marimba), 2019
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lagniappe
random sights
this morning, Oak Park, Ill.
voices I miss (more)
Steve Lacy (1934-2004, soprano saxophone) & Suzanna Klintcharova (harp), “Prospectus” (S. Lacy), live, Paris (?), 2002
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lagniappe
reading table
This road—
no one goes down it,
autumn evening.—Matsuo Basho, 1644-1694 (translated from the Japanese by Robert Hass)
music clip of the day 