last night
I heard these guys at the University of Chicago’s Mandel Hall, where the program ranged from Felix Mendelssohn to John Zorn.
Philip Glass, Mishima (1984-85, excerpt); Brooklyn Rider, New York, 2006
You can only hear with the ears you’ve got. And the ones I’ve got came of age in another era. But is it merely reflexive nostalgia to ask: Is there anything today—anything at all—that can compare with this?
Otis Redding (1941-1967), with Booker T. & the M.G.’s* and The Mar-Keys,** “I’ve Been Loving You Too Long” (O. Redding & J. Butler), live, Monterey Pop Festival, 1967
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lagniappe
reading table
What advice would you give to people who are looking to be happy?
For starters, learn how to cook.
—“Questions for Charles Simic: In-Verse Thinking,” interview by Deborah Solomon, New York Times, 2/3/08
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*Booker T. Jones, organ; Steve Cropper, guitar; Donald “Duck” Dunn, bass; Al Jackson, Jr., drums.
**Wayne Jackson, trumpet; Joe Arnold, alto saxophone; Andrew Love, tenor saxophone.
two takes
Bessie Jones (1902-1984), “Sometimes”
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Moby, “Honey” (Play, 1999)
Saturday night, between trips to Northwestern’s Pick-Staiger Hall, I caught these folks at Chicago’s City Winery.
Dolly Varden, “Forgiven Now,” live, Chicago area (SPACE, Evanston), 2011
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Here they talk about, and play songs from, their new album (For A While).
soundtrack of a marriage
On my first date with Suzanne, in 1974, we went to Chicago’s Jazz Showcase (then upstairs on Lincoln, just south of Fullerton), where we saw Sun Ra & His Arkestra. With a start like that, how could one ever go wrong? When we got married, on this date in 1977, Von Freeman played at the wedding, with pianist John Young. Years later John told me: “When I marry ’em, they stay married.”
Sun Ra & His Arkestra, live, Ann Arbor Blues & Jazz Festival, 1974
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Von Freeman, live (with John Young, piano), “Remember,” Chicago (Jazz Showcase), New Year’s Eve 1983 (according to the clip) or 1979 (according to NPR)
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lagniappe
Want to hear what Von and John sounded like on that cold, snowy night thirty-six years ago, at a church north of Chicago? Here (give it a few seconds). As you’ll hear, they played before, during (the processional was Ellington’s “In A Sentimental Mood”), and after the ceremony.
last night
I went back to Northwestern’s Pick-Staiger Hall—they’re in the midst of a Winter Chamber Music Festival—where I heard this string quartet, along with this clarinetist, play this piece.
Aaron Jay Kernis (1960-), Perpetual Chaconne (2012); Calder Quartet with John Bruce Yeh (clarinet), 2012
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
When we go out to hear live music, we realize, again, something that seldom occurs to us when we listen at home: the world, in its messy unpredictability, its insistent particularity, is way more interesting than we are.
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the music of words
Martin Luther King, Jr., Shreveport, La. (Galilee Baptist Church), 1958
two minutes of joy
I’m gonna sing while I’m here . . .
Bessie Jones (1902-1984), “So Glad I’m Here”
last night
I heard these folks at Northwestern University’s Pick-Staiger Concert Hall, where they played another piece by this composer (Last Round), a MacArthur “genius” grant recipient.
Osvaldo Golijov, Tenebrae; A Far Cry, Boston, 2011
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lagniappe
Here’s another take (four players, no conversation).
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musical thoughts
Nobody sits down and thinks, “I’m going to create some classical music.”
three takes
“Driving Wheel,” AKA “Driving Wheel Blues” (R. Sykes)
Buddy Guy & Junior Wells (BG, guitar; JW, harmonica and vocals; Jimmy Johnson, guitar; Dave Myers, bass; Odie Payne, drums), live, Portugal (Algarve Jazz Festival), 1978
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Junior Parker, 1961
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Roosevelt Sykes, 1936
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lagniappe
reading table
[I]t is out of adolescents who last a sufficient number of years that life makes old men.
—Marcel Proust, Finding Time Again (translated from French by Ian Patterson)
sui generis
DJ/rupture (turntables) & Andy Moor (guitar), “Hot Pink Version”; recorded in France (Orleans), 2007; photos by Andy Moor
music clip of the day 