sgcim

What happened to NYC https://www.amazon.com/Bloombergs-New-York-Geographies-Transformation/dp/0820336815

Just saw a great, hilarious, crazy Japanese film, "Survive Style Five+" (2004). Nothing as profound as Sono (my fave Japanese director), but just unbelievable visual imagination, and wild sense of humor. The director and writer never made another feature, and went back into advertising, so you're not gonna find it in the Criterion Collection. Definitely up to Miike's "Happiness of the Kakuturi's", but no singing.

Yeah, 'dat da boy wonder...

I just finished this one, as i mentioned in the thread on Perry's death, and it's a great read. PR was on the scene in the 50s at The Lennox School of jazz, and has some cool stories about Giuffre, Bill Evans and, Ornette (his quotes of Ornette's description of his method of composition are hilarious). Just the story about jumping up and down on Tony Scott's stomach as TS played, should give you an idea of the type of stories PR tells about his life.

I just finished his autobiography, "The Traveler". Definitely recommended reading! He had an incredible life. His father was the composer Earl Robinson,and his cousin was Alan Arkin, so he was brought up in the left-wing/artistic/Hollywood circle. He had a talent for magic tricks as a kid, and got more seriously into it later on in his life. I was surprised to to find that he was a disciple of Tony Scott, and he goes into detail about how Scott got that huge sound out of the clarinet. Scott lost most of his teeth towards the end of his life, which explains why his later records were of a lesser quality compared to his work in the 50s. Perry was equally at home in the bop idiom and the free idiom, and that enabled him to bring the clarinet into many diverse musical situations, most of which were mentioned in other posts.

I've heard a lot of the songs, but I never knew she was the first black woman of that period. in the Brill Building.

I always wondered who he was. Thanks for posting. I learn a lot from his interviews that I couldn't learn anywhere else.

Leonard Lopate had the author of this book on Rose Marie McCoy on his radio show on WBAI yesterday, and I had never heard of it before (or McCoy). The author met McCoy through a mutual acquaintance, and was probably the only writer to have access to McCoy, because McCoy was almost impossible to schedule interviews with, for various reasons. The dedicated author was retired when she wrote the book, so she had a lot of free time to interview the elusive songwriter, who was the first black woman to break into the entirely white,male province of the Brill Building songwriters, paving the way for Carole King and others. The music biz was less corporate back then, and McCoy (who was a talented singer) was able to walk into any office, belt out a song, and get a contract in a matter of minutes. As a result, her songs were recorded by everyone from Nat Cole to Elvis. Lopate himself told a story about how he and a friend were able to do the very same thing while they were in high school, and got a contract on the spot with The Sultans, after singing an agent a few of their songs. https://www.amazon.com/Thought-We-Were-Writing-Blues-ebook/dp/B00SVYJMLU

Yeah, but unless you're playing free, you have to play within a certain harmonic framework. Even Monk understood this.

Yeah, the piano was what I was talking about. It probably would've sounded fine if someone who respects a great song, like Tommy Flanagan, had accompanied her, but she's gotta use a young guy who wear a funky hat and plays wrong changes, cause 'they're the new generation, and soon they're comin' to your town..'.

They pretty much destroy this great Cy Coleman tune, which is pretty hard to do:

That pretty much describes Kevin Whitehead's segment, which I generally turn off in advance.

RIP to a great comic actor.

I'll always remember him as the first horn player to record a small group version of Raksin's sublime theme from 'The Bad and the Beautiful', and make it sound effortless and expressive as hell. I play with a decent trombone player who's been trying to play it for the last ten years, and can't even make it through the bridge. RIP, Urbie...

"Chops" with Joe Pass: https://www.allmusic.com/album/chops-mw0000104426

It might be fun for them to listen to some of the simpler Chico Hamilton sides with Fred Katz, and get the kids to play them together, with the uke playing the guitar part, and the alto playing the alto part. Maybe they could find some of their friends to act as rhythm section. But Fred Katz made some cello records on his own that the kid might enjoy. Alto player Hal McKusick made an album with four cello players, "In a 20th century Drawing Room" that's been re-issued on Lone Hill Jazz as "Hal McKusick Quartet; The Complete Barry Galbraith, Milt Hinton, and Osie Johnson Recordings". A very enjoyable album with good arrangements by Manny Albam.

Sorry, forgot. Bley is featured playing also back in 1962.

WNYC broadcast a four hour special on the Jazz Loft Project this morning, containing more in depth material on Monk, Hall Overton, Eugene Smith, and never before heard sessions with Chick Corea from 1962. This time you actually hear full conversations with Monk and Overton, as they discuss the scoring of the Monk Big Band Town Hall Concert, with Thelonious walking around in circles periodically, banging his shoe loudly on the floor. There's a lot of commentary by the few living musicians (Steve Swallow,Paul Bley and Ron Free) who played there, and also old tapes of the non-living ones. here's all four hours: https://www.wnyc.org/story/jazz-loft-anthology/

The Traveler, Perry Robinson's autobiography. It's really out...

The episodes are only 25 minutes long, but they seem twice as long due to the non-stop dialogue, unintentional(?) humor, supernatural mumbo jumbo and the confusion of three serial killers in competition with each other. It's not as sophisticated as the Korean or Japanese stuff, but it's hyper as hell, and a crazy experience. I forgot to mention "Struggle" a doc on Netflix about Szukalski, a once-famous Polish sculptor, whose work was destroyed in a Nazi bombing of Poland, and found himself living in Burbank. Pretty good if you're interested in sculpture, mad geniuses, and 20th century polish history.

Netflix just put some interesting foreign things out. "Parfum" (Perfume), a twisted German modernization in six parts, of the novel written by Suskind in 1985. It was made into a film before in 2006, but this version updates it to modern Germany, and changes the plot a great deal. It originally took place in 17th Century France. They also added an insane Hong Kong series called "Demon's Path', which is strange beyond belief.

A pianist I play with a lot, studied with Andy for six years, and the first thing Andy told him was, "After studying with me, you'll be playing so many reharms, you won't be able to get a gig in any club in New York!" His words proved to be prophetic...

I just heard this Norwegian composer for the first time on WKCR yesterday, and enjoyed the short orchestral pieces they played of his. I had to leave the car before they announced the title of the piece. I guess it was some type of orchestral Suite. Anybody know what piece it was? On Wiki, they said that 4/5 of his work was destroyed in a fire in 1970, but they've been trying to put together what pieces they can by individual orchestra parts, transcriptions, etc... Which of his pieces was considered his greatest work? Was it lost in the fire, or reconstructed? I tried to get to his website, but wasn't allowed because I didn't have the right software. TIA

A band I was in on Lawnguyland used to play at the North Hills Country Club, where Whitey Ford was at a lot of the gigs, completely bombed out of his mind. I explained to him how I used to model my wind up and cross armed pitching style after him, and he just kinda looked at me with a glazed look in his eyes...