Larry Kart

I'm going to try to be more conscientious and file some reports. If things go according to plan, I'll be catching guitarist Matt Schneider (solo set, I think), and cornetist Josh Berman's quartet (Keefe Jackson, reeds; Jason Roebke, bass; Marc Riordan, drums) tonight.

Couldn't be put any more clearly than that.

Well, I'm 66, and since maybe 2001, the music I choose to go out and listen to (usually at least once a week, sometimes much more than that) is mostly the stuff that the younger Chicago-area musicians are playing -- often avant-gardish to some degree I'd say, but typically not in ways that would leave many here scratching their heads. I know, why haven't I been writing/reporting here all the time about what I've been hearing? I have done that some times, but I think I don't more often because most of the people I'd be writing about are people who also are to some degree friends (and not only friends but also, because of the gap in age, almost sons and daughters), and I don't want to be writing about my friends in public anymore, for a whole lot of reasons -- some of which I understand, some of which I don't. Maybe I'll get past that, though, whatever "that" is.

The letter writer's point is that we typically don't think (granting the Big 3's stupidities) about the fact that the Big 3's chief competitors are based in countries where there is universal health care; thus their competitors' employee health care costs don't end up on those companies' bottom lines. Yes, in the short term (which may be the only term that matters for the Big 3's survival) Jim's "Subtract my living expenses & I'd have a lot more money in the bank as well, so what does that prove, really? A more salient question might be this - how much revenue would they need now to maintain those health care costs & still remain profitable?" makes sense. But that doesn't mean that we shouldn't wonder why Japan, Germany, France, and a lot of other countries have universal health care, and we don't. Those countries can afford it, and we can't? Also, I've heard "That's not how we do it here" stories like Jim A's before and tended to discount them because I assumed that union-busting might be at work. When it comes from Jim A., though, by way of his father, I have no doubts that the problems lie on both sides. I'm trying to think of my own direct working experiences, particularly in the newspaper business. Yes, there were drones and even some sabotuers around, but the degree to which you could count on almost everyone to do whatever it took to make things work was very high -- so much so that you almost didn't think about it. In part that had to do with the fact that some of us had our actual names attached to what we were doing, but it was essentially esprit de corps. You knew that the person next to you probably was darned good, and you wouldn't dream of letting him or her down if you could help it. On the other hand, this didn't mean that we regarded the highest higher ups there with awe or even deference, because we were in a position to know, often enough, when they were clothed and when they were pants-less. Rather, bonds of loyalty, team-identity, whatever, extended sideways and only as far up as it made sense for them to go -- and at one time that was far enough.

Perhaps it's a point that's been made before here, but look at this third letter to the editor (Betsey Britton's) in today's NY Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/20/opinion/l20detroit.html I also recall reading recently that if you subtracted worker's health care costs from GM's bottom line, the company would be profitable right now, even as screwed up as its other policies are.

Indeed, but the appearance of "formula" through "codification" is not one of them, nor is the appearance of "cliche" in the eyes of certain beholders of these formulae. Dig? I'm not sure. If you think you're playing back to me something that I said, I don't recall saying anything like that.

Gotcha.

You are speaking for yourself, & I for me. Actually, again, for me, verbal languages are a cheapening of the non-verbal languages (including music). These cheaper versions are certainly utilitarian and not without their own potential artfulness, but they inevitably give us a limited dimensionality that the non-verbal languages take over and run with as a matter of course. Would I be happier in a world where nobody spoke or wrote "words", but communicated only through sight, gesture, touch, scent, and "non-verbal" sounds? To automatically assume yes might be a little too "Romantic", but to automatically assume no might bespeak to a cynicism rooted in a lack of imagination, or maybe just an inability to conceive of the abstract actually becoming/being specific, that the perceieved "limitation" is in fact mine. "music is not quite a language in the way that verbal languages are". well. a sequoia is not quite a tree in the way that a bonsai is either. Let us not attempt to see justify the ultimately small scope of the verbal by using the strengths of its limitations to pretend that those strengths carry the day outside of their own immediate realm. Because they do not. When it comes to fully conveying the infinite fullness of life, verbal languages are ultimately verylimited languages. Just to be clear -- I'm not saying that music and other non-verbal languages are lesser languages than verbal languages, not at all; they're just different in some key respects. As for the "smaller," "very limited" scope of the verbal, I like your phrase the "strengths of its limitations," which gets right down to what I'm talking about, but think you underrate the reach of those strengths. If what can be said and understood in words is logically less than the infinite fullness of life -- because the universe includes all words and many more things besides -- I've yet to see that there's any conflict or contest, or even fundamental lack of contact, between the verbal and the non-verbal. Yes, there's the Tower of Babel, but the cosmic "all" really likes verbal language, I think, or at least finds it and our use of it to be touching/amusing; otherwise we wouldn't be allowed to proceed as we do.

Are we agreed that it's spam, rather than spaciness? If it's the former, I'll delete the thread.

Surely language doesn't exist UNTIL it's codified. MG Not sure I agree with that... Surely (and don't call me "Shirley") the truth lies somewhere in between -- that is, if we're talking about literal (spoken, then in most cases written-down) verbal languages. The most "expressive" (in itself) sound or series of would-be communicative sounds doesn't really work until others get and agree that that sound or series of sounds means whatever it means or is supposed to mean. In particular, such codification means that, say, what "take my chair" indicates doesn't depend that heavily on my "performance" of "take my chair." Now, if you're talking analogously, and want to bring into the tent other non-verbal languages, like music, their "languageness" is a good deal looser and different than that of verbal languages. We are, at least in my experience, prepared to deal with pleasure and interest with large swatches of music whose principles of order we don't readily detect. Nor is the language of any music that I'm aware of -- even the simplest, most direct, and most familiar -- as enclosed by the "this means that" process as is the case with verbal languages. Musical sounds can always be taken as "just sounds," while the sounds that make up words can always be understood as words, which accumulate into discourse, unless one consciously or inadvertently disguises those sounds, or one is not engaging in discourse (i.e. words are being used but one has no intent to shape them into sentences), or the auditor doesn't know the language. I'm reminded BTW of the brutal running battle in language affairs between prescriptivists (that would be, among others, people who write usage guides and who say that there are right and wrong ways to use the language), and descriptivists (that would be most professional linguists, who say that there are no right and wrong usages, only usages -- e.g. "Descriptive grammar has nothing to do with telling people what they should say." "Languages are self-regulating systems that can be left to take care of themselves"). A wise man on the prescriptive side notes that no descriptivist linguist writes or publicly speaks other than in some version of standard English (or whatever language the linguist is using). Fascinating discussion. How does one account for the less codified uses of language? I'm thinking of poetry, for instance, which can be studied intensively to extract its precise meaning. Or scat? Or how about primal screaming? (late-period Coltrane?). Or even the howling emanating from one of the 100 best vocalists of all time at rock 'n' roll concerts? The rules of language don't strictly apply, yet communication is achieved. I guess I'm trying to sharpen the point that while rules and "codification" of languages are necessary, it's also necessary to break those rules. The English language itself, is a constantly evolving thing, is it not? The rules, in other words, are constantly changing. I would say that there two kinds of "broken" rules (though I don't like the term "rules" because it quite rightly puts so many peoples' backs up). If a broken rule (how about habit or formula?) is broken because someone has in effect proposed a new habit or formula that then is felt by the community (such as it is) to be coherent and useful, nothing really was broken, just changed. On the other hand, some people say that it's "necessary to break the rules" because they like to/need to break things, as in "destroy" them. And there is, I believe, such a thing as negative creation -- where, when the time is right, the outright destruction of a whole bunch of artistic habits that does nothing but destroy those habits is just what is needed, even though nothing comes from it other than the fact of bare, cleared ground. As for poetry, I don't see where it's a less codified way of using language for any poet who's any good. It's just that every good poet is more likely to be using a "code" that's a good more personal than the codes that are being used by, say, good expository writers. The work of most good poets is more codified (as in "highly worked in a personal manner"), especially in terms of rhythm and sound, than the work of most expository writers; the nature of the medium (it's closeness to song, its tendency to communicate things that don't, or don't yet, fall within the bounds of rational discourse, etc.) seems to demand that.

Some important points made here, I think: "Advantages of Corporate Bankruptcy Shrink": http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/19/business...ptcy&st=nyt

No, music is not quite a language in the way that verbal languages are (as I've tried to explain above -- assuming I know what I'm talking about). About your "We can hear something we've never heard before and understand it right away, no codification involved. Then as more people get hold of it and use it to represent at least as much as to present, it gets codified" -- focusing on your "as more people get hold of it and use it to represent at least as much as to present" (which fits some but certainly not all of what happens; there'd be, for one, no Ben Webster without Coleman Hawkins, but was Webster representing at least as much presenting? no way), our immediate understanding of something we've never heard before becomes over time, under circumstances that frequently occur, a different understanding. Think of codification not as finger-wagging but as an organic elaboration of what's potentially, often irresistibly there. I know, "codification" can be and has been both, but ... as that old commercial says, it's a life form AND a disease.

Surely language doesn't exist UNTIL it's codified. MG Not sure I agree with that... Surely (and don't call me "Shirley") the truth lies somewhere in between -- that is, if we're talking about literal (spoken, then in most cases written-down) verbal languages. The most "expressive" (in itself) sound or series of would-be communicative sounds doesn't really work until others get and agree that that sound or series of sounds means whatever it means or is supposed to mean. In particular, such codification means that, say, what "take my chair" indicates doesn't depend that heavily on my "performance" of "take my chair." Now, if you're talking analogously, and want to bring into the tent other non-verbal languages, like music, their "languageness" is a good deal looser and different than that of verbal languages. We are, at least in my experience, prepared to deal with pleasure and interest with large swatches of music whose principles of order we don't readily detect. Nor is the language of any music that I'm aware of -- even the simplest, most direct, and most familiar -- as enclosed by the "this means that" process as is the case with verbal languages. Musical sounds can always be taken as "just sounds," while the sounds that make up words can always be understood as words, which accumulate into discourse, unless one consciously or inadvertently disguises those sounds, or one is not engaging in discourse (i.e. words are being used but one has no intent to shape them into sentences), or the auditor doesn't know the language. I'm reminded BTW of the brutal running battle in language affairs between prescriptivists (that would be, among others, people who write usage guides and who say that there are right and wrong ways to use the language), and descriptivists (that would be most professional linguists, who say that there are no right and wrong usages, only usages -- e.g. "Descriptive grammar has nothing to do with telling people what they should say." "Languages are self-regulating systems that can be left to take care of themselves"). A wise man on the prescriptive side notes that no descriptivist linguist writes or publicly speaks other than in some version of standard English (or whatever language the linguist is using).

James P's 1944 tribute-to-Waller recordings for Decca are very moving.

Haven't heard this one yet, but I have heard Mr. Melito before with Grant Stewart; he's a good drummer.

A link (Hi there, 7/4) to a New Republic article on the 7 versus 11 problem: http://www.tnr.com/politics/story.html?id=...59-2dfa3a3211bf

More than that from a somewhat different perspective from Peter Cohan but saying more about Chapter 7 versus Chapter 11; they are not at all the same): Will GM file for Chapter 7 or Chapter 11? Posted Nov 12th 2008 9:00AM by Peter Cohan Filed under: General Motors (GM) On Monday I told a TV interviewer that General Motors (NYSE: GM) would probably not last the week. It is looking more like that prediction will come true. With $16.2 billion in cash, GM needs $10 billion to pay its bills. But it will go through that by the end of 2008 since it is probably in default on $6 billion worth of credit agreements which would require GM to pay back those loans immediately. And GM has already been bankrupt in an accounting sense for years -- its liabilities exceed its assets by $58 billion ($12 billion more than in 2007). This raises many questions: Why is GM in this condition? What are its options? Should the U.S. government step in? Does it matter? Where do the bailouts end? GM's basic problem is that it spent decades making excuses for why it could not give customers superior value rather than building better vehicles. With 2.5 million jobs on the line, Chapter 7 -- a complete liquidation of its assets -- could throw all these people out of work. Who are these people? Auto companies are big buyers of manufactured steel, aluminum, iron, copper, plastics, rubber and electronics -- and their dealers are people too. One study estimates that the workers in these companies could lose $125 billion in income. So the U.S. government could provide a financial guarantee and some money to encourage financial institutions to give debtor-in-possession (DIP) financing which would allow GM to operate in Chapter 11. As a condition of the deal, its top executives ranks should be replaced with strategists who can decide which parts of GM to close or sell, and which can operate profitably. A better solution would be a pre-packaged bankruptcy where new contracts with creditors would be negotiated before the filling -- but GM is probably too complex to accomplish this ahead of time. We will stop bailing out people when we run out of bailout money and lobbyists to fight for it. Starting with the bailout of Bear Stearns, the U.S. lost any logical basis for turning down anyone seeking taxpayer money. For example, why did the U.S. think it was OK to give $29 billion to keep Bear Stearns from going under but was quite comfortable letting Lehman Brothers file its $639 billion bankruptcy? Cat got your tongue Hank? The simple fact is that GM is big enough to hire the lobbyists it needs to make the case that what's bad for GM is bad for America. (And the average taxpayer is not.) The big economic crime is that GM's board kept supporting the CEO who presided over a 96% loss in shareholder value since he took over in June 2000. If GM had invested the profits from SUVs and vehicle financing that it made during the boom years into cars that customers were eager to buy, it would not be on the brink of bankruptcy. If President Bush resigns this week, President-Elect Obama could take over and make a terrible choice (GM in Chapter 11) to avoid a catastrophic one (GM in Chapter 7). Since that won't happen, it looks to me like GM could be in Chapter 7 very soon -- adding another remarkable "accomplishment" to a historic legacy. Peter Cohan is President of Peter S. Cohan & Associates. He also teaches management at Babson College and edits The Cohan Letter. He has no financial interest in GM securities.

From Brad DeLong's blog, quoting from Felix Salmon (the diference between Chapter 7 and Chapter 11 bankruptcies is vast and crucial; they're as different as night from day): Felix Salmon Says: Not Bailout or Bankruptcy But Bailout and Bankruptcy for GM He writes: GM: The Bailout vs Bankruptcy Meme: At heart, this argument is simple. There's no available DIP financing for an orderly Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and Chapter 7 liquidation would be disastrous, therefore we need a bailout which avoids any kind of bankruptcy at all. But I don't see why a government bailout must, ipso facto, avoid any kind of bankruptcy. GM alone has $35 billion in long-term debt, most of which is trading at about 20 cents on the dollar. That might only be a drop in the bucket compared to its total liabilities of $193 billion, but it's a good place to start: if bondholders took an 80% writedown while the government pitched in $12 billion of preferred equity in the post-restructuring entity, that's a $40 billion improvement to GM's balance sheet right there. And of course bankruptcy would give GM the opportunity to renegotiate onerous contracts with its dealers, as well as other real and contingent liabilities. This is what I've been referring to as a "bail-in", and it makes quite a lot of sense on its face. Let the government provide the necessary financing, but ensure that bondholders share some of the pain as well, especially since doing so would simply ratify the mark-to-market losses they've already taken. Such a plan would involve working out the details of a bankruptcy in advance: there are large dangers involved when a company the size of GM enters bankruptcy without any clear conception of how it might exit. So there would need to be serious negotiations between all of GM's stakeholders and the government -- negotiations which, I'll concede, would be all but impossible during this uncomfortable interregnum between the election and the inauguration. Even if GM can somehow muddle through until January, it can hardly expect such negotiations to be concluded in a matter of weeks. So there's a timing problem here, given that the present administration has demonstrated zero inclination to help out Detroit. But I still think that it would be useful to stop thinking of a bailout as an alternative to bankruptcy, and start thinking more imaginatively about the different mechanisms, including both government funds and bankruptcy, which could help put Detroit on a more sustainable footing. The government could, for one thing, provide DIP financing...

PLEASE don't tell me her Basin Street album is fake. See post #16 on the "Fake live albums" thread on "Discography."

I said you were right in your complaint and explained how it happened. What more do you want -- a pint of spinal fluid?

Sorry -- you're right. But I wasn't posting it, I think, in the same way you used to do. I was doing so in hot blood, in order to try to make a point about something else that I'd already begun to make and couldn't continue to make unless the review were in front of us. I won't do it again, though.

Good idea. Please pass the hemp.

quote name='Mark Stryker' date='Nov 15 2008, 03:45 PM' post='855231'] Larry, I'm surprised that two logical explanations seem to have eluded you as an old newspaper man -- either it was the damn copydesk that screwed it up or carelessness on the writer's part induced by deadline pressures, distractions or the many varieties of gremlins that have a way of getting between your brain and your best-intentioned copy. I'm guessing that Tony meant to write "composed in France" -- a factually accurate statement that makes sense to note in the context because Weill was on the move in those years -- but instead wrote "composed in French" and then never caught the slip, reading over it because we often don't notice our own typos. If that's the case, then 99 out of 100 copy editors would not have questioned the phrasing. Alternatively, Tony may have written something awkwardly (or not) and in making a change, the copy editor condensed it to "written in French" and introduced the problem. Of course, it is possible that Tony meant to write what he did, but we all have brain cramps. No harm, no foul.

Sure to all the above -- but however much the language one speaks, or the language in which your singers are singing (if you're writing for voices), matters, you don't say Wagner or Mahler composed "in German" or Ravel or Offenbach "in French." It's a usage error, not a conceptual thing. Tommasini should have said: "'Maria Galante,' in which Weill sets [or works with] a French text, etc." -- or something of the sort.

Today's NY Times has a review by Anthony Tommasini of Kurt Weill's little-known 1934 musical "Maria Galante," which Tommasini said Weill "composed in French." Well, the libretto is in French (and not even by Weill but by Jacques Deval), but the music was composed in ... music, no?