jeffcrom

I drove through Gary once, on my way from Michigan to Chicago. I remember thinking, "This is the worst place I've ever been." (I hope nobody from Gary is online here.) But yes, it was a great evening. It became a real interaction - the artists were obviously digging the music, and the band was digging the iron.

Do the liner notes explain who/what "Allegra" is? Always wondered about that. There are no liner notes on the album, but a little poking around the web suggests that Allegra is a pretty cool person!

Pete Yellin - Dance of Allegra (Mainstream). Mr. Yellin's debut album featured a pretty impressive band: Eddie Henderson, Kenny Barron, Stanley Clarke, Billy Hart, and Dom Um Romao.

Never been around a steel mill, so I don't know. Hard to describe - the smell was pungent without being pleasant or particularly unpleasant.

The 4th Ward Afro Klezmer Orchestra, of which I am a member, played a gig in the Castleberry Hill district of Atlanta last night. In the past ten years, Castleberry Hill has developed into a very interesting area with lots of art galleries and bars, and frequent art "happenings." When I got to the gig, I found out, to my surprise, that we were accompanying an iron pour. A group of artists who work in iron had a furnace and molds set up, and about 45 minutes into our set, they opened up a sluice and molten iron poured into a bucket - that's what's happening in the first picture. The second picture shows them pouring the iron into molds. The guys (and a girl) were dancing to our tunes as they worked. It was a pretty amazing experience. And now I know what molten iron smells like. These pictures were taken the great Atlanta music photographer Vincent Tseng. I've included a post-gig picture of the band because I think we look so damn handsome.

There were two recording bans: http://en.wikipedia....on_of_Musicians Thanks Bill. I wasn't aware of the 1948 ban. The 1948 ban wasn't as thoroughly observed as the earlier ban. A lot of musicians didn't feel that it was in their best interest, and some smaller record companies kept recording sessions, albeit discreetly. Savoy, for instance, recorded right through it the ban, including a couple of Charlie Parker sessions in September.

Wasn't that one analysed as a work of genius by André Hodeir in Jazz: Its Evolution and Essence? I didn't think so, and a quick thumb through the book suggests not. I did find this passage, which surprised me: The year 1947, which was fertile in such masterpieces as DON'T BLAME ME, SCRAPPLE FROM THE APPLE, PARKER'S MOOD, and the two versions of EMBRACEABLE YOU, was unhappily followed by a break in Parker's production. Did these fine records sell badly? It may be. Was he really unaware of the U.S. recording ban? (And I edited my original post to put in a missing word.)

Charlie Parker - "Embraceable You," take one. Not only is Bird's improvisation just beautiful, its tight construction should be the envy of every composer. And Bird just picked up the horn and played it in real time.

Me too - I've been looking for that one for years.

Paul Bley & Scorpio (Milestone). If The Paul Bley Synthesizer Show, Bley's previous Milestone album, is something of a period piece, this one is a classic, even if a few of the keyboard sounds fall into the "seemed like a good idea at the time" category.

Thanks to all. It's been a somewhat odd day, but I am now relaxing with some good music on the turntable, a book of Lee Friedlander photographs, and a glass of something fairly strong. Cheers!

That makes perfect sense. The idea was to raise a chimp and a bonobo together to compare/contrast their language acquisition.

The book is Piano Demon by Brendan Koerner. It's short, and just good, rather than great, but it's only $1.99 on Amazon. I was going to recommend it when I saw this thread, but I couldn't find it at Barnes & Noble. It seems to be available only for the Amazon Kindle; I have no idea whether the download would be compatible with the Nook.

I'm not sure. I'll ask Karen when she gets home - she's at a meeting in California at the moment.

My wife Karen is heartbroken today. Panbanisha, a bonobo who Karen raised for the first several years of her life, died today at the age of 26 at the Great Ape Trust in Iowa. Karen is a research psychologist and chair of the psych department at Spelman College in Atlanta, but earlier in her career, before I met her, she worked at the Language Research Center, which studies primate language and intelligence. Karen was the primary caregiver for Panbanisha and Panzee, a chimpanzee. She and "the girls" communicated with a symbol board containing several hundred lexigrams. Both Panzee (who is still living at the Language Research Center) and Panbanisha were quite intelligent and were adept at "talking" with humans. Karen visits Panzee every once in a while, but hadn't seen Panbanisha since she moved to Iowa in 2005. Her are some old pictures of Karen and her girls, from 1987 to 1989. Panbanisha is the ape on the right or on top in all the pictures. And in case you're not sure, bonobos are related to chimpanzees; they are now endangered, and they're the species whose DNA most closely resembles that of humans.

The Paul Bley Synthesizer Show (Milestone). In its way, as dated as those 1920s dance band 78s I love. And I love this just as much.

Cannonball Adderley - Black Messiah (Capitol); sides one and four. This 1972 live date is all over the place, which amuses me. Fela - Shuffering and Shmiling (Celluloid) Annette Peacock - I'm the One (RCA). A quite remarkable avant-rock album, in my opinion. Paul Bley is on two cuts.

Glad it was a good one, Neal!

Happy birthday to my dad (85) and to Paul (what, 87?).

I posted this yesterday, but it was lost in The Troubles:

Earl Humphrey - Andrew Jefferson Four - Have You Ever Been Lonely (504). Earl is not as well-known as his brothers Percy and Willie (he spent years with traveling shows), but he was highly regarded among New Orleans musicians.

Ted Curson - Typical Ted (Trident)

I really admired his musical range. RIP.

Gil Melle - Tome VI (Verve stereo)

Onzy Matthews - Blues With a Touch of Elegance (Capitol stereo)