Sunday, December 22nd
two takes
“Strange Man” (D. L. Coates)
Patty Griffin, live, London, 2013
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Dorothy Love Coates (1928-2002; MCOTD Hall of Famer), recording, 1968
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lagniappe
art beat
Helen Levitt (1913-2009), New York, c. 1940
music clip of the day
jazz/blues/rock/classical/gospel/more
Tag: music clip of the day
2013
2013
Saturday, December 21st
never enough
Johann Sebastian Bach, Goldberg Variations (excerpts); Glenn Gould (piano), live, 1964
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lagniappe
radio: Bach Festival 2013
If, like me, you can’t get enough Bach, you’re in luck. Tonight through New Year’s Eve, it’s all Bach all the time at WKCR-FM (Columbia University).
*****
reading table
One, seven, three, five—
Nothing to rely on in this or any world;
Nighttime falls and the water is flooded with moonlight.
Here in the Dragon’s jaws:
Many exquisite jewels.—Setcho Juken (980-1052)
2013
Friday, December 20th
alone
Bill Frisell (guitar), “Nowhere Man,” “In My Life,” “Strawberry Fields Forever,” live, Washington, D.C., 2012
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lagniappe
random thoughts
Of this I am sure: The longer I live the more mysterious—the more unknowable—is life.
2013
Thursday, December 19th
Heaven isn’t somewhere else. It’s right here, right now. Don’t believe me? Put on a pair of headphones. Close your eyes. Listen.
Johann Sebastian Bach, Suite No. 5 in C minor for Unaccompanied Cello; Anner Bylsma, live, Germany (Dornheim), 2000
#1
#2 (ends at 9:15)
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lagniappe
art beat
Lee Friedlander (1934-), Kyoto, 1984
2013
Wednesday, December 18th
what’s new
Glasser, live, London (Boiler Room), 2013
“Forge”
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“Dissect”
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“Landscape”
2013
Tuesday, December 17th
sounds of Chicago
Tonight these guys, who play all over the world, will be at a little club on the city’s northwest side, the Hideout, as will I.
DKV Trio (Hamid Drake, drums; Kent Kessler, bass; Ken Vandermark, reeds), live, Italy (Sant’Anna Arresi Jazz Festival), 2008
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Joy—no one gives me more than Hamid Drake.
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lagniappe
reading table
God keep me from ever completing anything.
—Herman Melville (1819-1891), Moby-Dick
2013
Monday, December 16th
Something beautiful to begin the week.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Piano Concerto No. 23 in A major, excerpt (2nd movt., Adagio); Hélène Grimaud (piano), Bavarian Radio Chamber Orchestra
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
It is music and dancing that makes me at peace with the world and at peace with myself.
—Nelson Mandela (July 18, 1918-December 5, 2013)
2013
Sunday, December 15th
two takes
The Caravans (feat. Cassietta George), “Walk Around Heaven All Day”
Live
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Recording, 1964
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lagniappe
reading table
Interview of Alice Munro, last month
It’s hard to imagine a male writer, having just won the Nobel Prize in Literature, being so direct, so natural, so down to earth.
2013
Saturday, December 14th
two takes
This is, to these ears, exhilarating.
Tim Berne’s Snakeoil,* “Cornered (Duck)”
Live, New York (The Stone), 5/8/13
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Live, Washington, D.C (Atlas Performing Arts Center), 10/9/13
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
Music should be no more complex than it needs to be. And no matter how complicated it may actually be, it should never seem that way to the listener. If it does, immediacy has deteriorated into abstraction.
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*TB, alto saxophone; Oscar Noriega, bass clarinet, clarinet; Matt Mitchell, piano; Ches Smith, percussion.
2013
Friday, December 13th
only rock ’n’ roll
Superchunk, “Void” (2013)
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lagniappe
reading table
Cormac McCarthy, particularly in a book like Blood Meridian, is writing an English very remote from our own. It’s more like the King James Bible on acid, right?
—David Foster Wallace (1962-2008), in Quack This Way: David Foster Wallace & Bryan A. Garner Talk Language and Writing (2013)
music clip of the day 