sounds of New York
Jaimie Branch (trumpet), Darius Jones (alto saxophone), Joe McPhee (soprano saxophone), William Parker (bass), Ronnie Burrage (drums), Juma Sultan (percussion), live, New York, 2018
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Chicago
passings
Jemeel Mondoc, alto saxophonist, August 5, 1946 – August 29, 2021
New World Pygmies (JM, alto saxophone; William Parker, bass; Hamid Drake [MCOTD Hall of Fame], drums), live, 2018
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lagniappe
random sights
Sunday, outside Chicago (Salt Creek Trail)
passings
Milford Graves, drummer (among other things),* August 20, 1941–February 12, 2021
Milford Graves HeArt Quintet (MG, drums, voice; Charles Gayle, tenor saxophone; Hugh Glover, alto saxophone; Ted Daniels, trumpet; William Parker, bass), live, New York, 2015
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Oak Park, Ill.
*****
According to the New York Times obituary, Graves “was also a botanist, acupuncturist, martial artist, impresario, college professor, visual artist and student of the human heartbeat.”
sounds of New York
Seraphic Light (Daniel Carter, trumpet, saxophone; Matthew Shipp, piano; William Parker, bass), live (dedicated to visual artist Marilyn Sontag, Carter’s longtime partner), New York, 2018
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lagniappe
random sights
a while ago, outside Chicago (Illinois Prairie Path)
what’s new
William Parker Trio (WP, bass; Ava Mendoza, guitar; Gerald Cleaver, drums), live (performance begins at 3:10), New York (live-streamed by Skopje Jazz Festival, North Macedonia), 10/15/20
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lagniappe
random sights
other day, Chicago
*****
reading table
Now is the time to experiment, and there is no choice but to experiment.
—Gustavo Dudamel (1981-), Music & Artistic Director, Los Angeles Philharmonic (quoted in Alex Ross, “The L.A. Philharmonic’s Emotional Return to an Empty Hollywood Bowl,” New Yorker, 9/28/20)
sounds of New York
This drummer can play.
Dave Sewelson (baritone saxophone), William Parker (bass), Marvin Bugalu Smith (drums), live, New York, 2017
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lagniappe
art beat
other day, Oak Park, Ill. (bird unknown)
Is any alto player more eloquent?
Joe McPhee (alto saxophone), William Parker (bass), Gerald Cleaver (drums), live, New York, 2014
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lagniappe
art beat
Paul Strand (1890-1976), Abandoned Window, 1944
more
William Parker’s In Order To Survive (WP, bass; Hamid Drake, drums, MCOTD Hall of Fame; Cooper-Moore, piano, vocals; Lewis Barnes, trumpet; Rob Brown, alto saxophone), “Hymn,” live, New York, 2013
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lagniappe
reading table
He isn’t doing that right—that was a very important one. It was what Astaire claimed he was thinking whenever he watched himself onscreen, and I noted that third-person pronoun. This is what I understood by it: that for Astaire the person in the film was not especially connected with him. And I took this to heart, or rather, it echoed a feeling I already had, mainly that it was important to treat oneself as a kind of stranger, to remain unattached and unprejudiced in your own case. I thought you needed to think like that to achieve anything in this world. Yes, I thought that was a very elegant attitude.
—Zadie Smith, Swing Time
MCOTD Hall of Fame
William Parker’s In Order To Survive (WP, bass, composition; Hamid Drake, drums, MCOTD Hall of Fame;* Lewis Barnes, trumpet; Rob Brown, alto saxophone; Cooper-Moore, piano), “Criminals in the White House,” live, New York, 2013
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lagniappe
radio
Today—his birthday—it’s all Ornette Coleman all day on WKCR-FM (Columbia University).
*****
*With saxophonists Von Freeman and Henry Threadgill; trumpeter Lester Bowie; gospel singer Dorothy Love Coates; composer Morton Feldman; poets John Berryman, William Bronk, and Wislawa Szymborska; and photographer Helen Levitt.
sounds of New York
As funky as it is abstract, as abstract as it is funky—like life itself.
Farmers by Nature (Craig Taborn, piano; William Parker, bass; Gerald Cleaver, drums), live, Paris, 2011
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lagniappe
art beat: other day, Whitney Museum of American Art (New York)
Stuart Davis (1892-1964), Landscape with Garage Lights, 1931-32 (Stuart Davis: In Full Swing, through 9/25/16)
