Larry Kart

Too old, too tired (at least I have been for a while), and too many "life issues" to deal with. Posting here and accepting an occasional liner note job for a record that I like seems to be what fits. But it could be fun. In particular, I sometimes think what it would be like to have Ratliff or Chinen's gig, to be able to hear all that you physically could hear, react to/think about it right quick, and then put your thoughts in print immediately. From prior experience, there's a mutually stimulating rhythm that can develop between yourself and the scene under such circumstances. I believe Mark Stryker has been/is operating along those lines.

Also, if Hatto did have cancer and it was diagnosed in 1966 (IIRC that was the story), she then lived another 40 years? And I don't recall that remission was part of the tale. Probably not utterly unprecedented, if true, but way out on the edge somewhere.

Hard for me now to recall everything that was said about the Hatto hoax on rec.music.classical.recordings before and after the hoax was uncovered, but, again IIRC, Singer's New Yorker piece struck me as much too credulous. The only thing we know for sure about Hatto is that she played the piano at one time; as far as I know, virtually everything else that has not been firmly established to have been faked/fraudulent has NOT been nailed down, including two things in particular -- did Hatto have cancer and when did she die? I know that her husband says June 2006 for her death date (mighty convenient in the light of all that has happened), but I wouldn't be surprised if that was faked too and that Hatto died years ago. Yes, people supposedly talked to her on the phone in recent years, but I can easily see hubby W B-C doing "Hatto" a la Peter Sellers or Dame Edna. As for her oncologist, who is cited here and there along lines that don't quite support W B-C in one or more senses but do support him in others (e.g. Hatto did have cancer? was she alive until 2006?) -- again, has anyone seen this dude face-to-face and verified who he is? I know in my bones how guys like W B-C operate, and one of their key, near-infallible moves is to thrust alleged sad weakness before us (unfairly neglected woman dying of cancer) and then, when the jig threatens to be up, "admit" to certain things that in effect bolster some remaining aspects of what almost always is a wholesale ongoing fraud -- wholesale beyond the wildest imaginings of a sober, human interest-y New Yorker writer. What keeps the W B-Cs of the world going is their ability to maintain some shred of the basically fraudulent under all conditions and at all times; the core of their identity is their ability/need to get you to believe in real time, while they bear witness to your belief, something that they've made up almost completely, working in just enough bits of fact. I would hazard the guess that their biggest thrills come when the jig is up (or it seems so to us), when they can semi-confess to the likes of a Mark Singer while still keeping their working hand moving about covertly in their pants.

Answer: Because Ankiel doesn't yet have any stats of consequence? Also, because Ankiel has been sold to us as a three-part human interest story -- phenom, then wildman-headcase-failure of spectacular proportions, finally as a comeback kid and at a whole new position to boot (guess that makes it a four-parter). Given all that, it's understandably tough for most citizens to get their heads around a switch from that story arc to an utterly new and downbeat one. Oh, yes -- and Rick isn't Black.

At work (a textbook publishing house) in 1970. Interestingly, perhaps, an older married friend there had mentioned to me, when I was lamenting various aspects of a long semi-ugly relationship that had come to an end several months befor and obviously never should have begun, that men are like animals in the sense that when it comes time for them to mate (as in pair off) they will (probably for the first time in their lives) begin to find/see the kind of women that they should pair off with -- and if you're lucky, it will be one women, and she'll feel the same way about you.

At least OK earned a portion of his ego by helping start a label and actually work with the artists involved. What did Feather ever do, based on Albertson's letter, besides write a book and allegedly write some songs? That's a tough call, between LF and OK. As Chuck says, LF did a lot of good and other things that were not good. In the former category, in addition to his assiduous and often valuable journalism, LF produced a number of recordings, organized concerts, and played significant roles in the early careers of Dinah Washington, Sarah Vaughan, and (especially) George Shearing -- though how significant his role was in Washington's case is, as we know, a matter of some dispute. In the latter category, in addition to his bodacious ego and Machiavellian ways, LF's championing of modern jazz in the mid-1940s definitely had its dark side, because LF felt that championing etc. demanded that much so-called traditional jazz be sneered at. Thus, for example, in LF's scheme of things Jelly Roll Morton was an incompetent fraud, a "fact" that LF never ceased to proclaim. In the annoying "moldy fig" versus "progressive" wars of the '40s, which wasted so much energy, polluted the atmosphere, and were even hurtful to some musicians, LF was among the key figures. Oh, yes -- his Blindfold Tests (an idea that I'm pretty sure LF originated; he certainly claimed so, and I don't recall anyone weighing in to the contrary) were often marred by LF playing bad and/or unrepresentative recordings by musicians he didn't like and which he hoped would then be put down by the musician taking the Blindfold Test. As for OK, Chris's accounts here and elsewhere of OK's work at Riverside make it clear that in his view, which I trust, Bill Grauer, not OK, was the key figure there, and that at recording sessions in particular OK was seldom a significant party and sometimes a person who hampered things. It's my impression that OK's later career in the jazz record biz has been in tune with that estimate.

Grig is my second-favorite composer, right after Bethoven.

There's an earlier recording from two months earlier, also with Urbie Green on board but with a smaller ensemble, for a John Carisi album that wasn't released at the time. It's in the "RCA Victor Jazz Workshop - The Arrangers" compilation (it also has a new take on Carisi's "Israel"). F I know that "Springsville" too (it's great); just assumed that the Green came first and didn't check. Both performances definitely need to be heard, though; they're different in tone and detail.

Chris -- I've heard tales of Leonard's, shall we say, personality, but I'd never encountered him in his own semi-private words before. Wow. Actually, I did have one passing encounter with LF at work that matches up with his review of your Bessie Smith biography. Back in 1988 I wrote a very negative review of "The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz." Then, I don't recall from whom, I got a copy of the fairly thick, slick-paper program from the L.A.-based Playboy Jazz Festival. In the program was a piece (not written by LF but by one his young acolytes; LF played a prominent role in the festival) in which my review was quoted from extensively and was praised for its accuracy, wit, etc. This all seemed a bit odd and shoe-horned in -- why was there an article in a Playboy Jazz Festival program that focused on a book review written several months before for the Chicago Tribune? -- but after a minute, I figured it out. "The New Grove" was the chief rival of LF's "The Biographical Enycylopedia of Jazz," and LF wanted to take down "The New Grove," though he was aware that a direct assault by him on "The New Grove" in this context would be seen as self-serving. So he got this acolyte to write a piece in which abundant references were made to a negative review of "The New Grove" by a third party. Neat.

Depends on what kind of stuff you like, but if that's the one with Doug Mettome and Al Cohn on bass clarinet, I found it to be very nice. Not a date of pulse-pounding excitement, but that's not Green's thing anyway. The Fresh Sound repackaging of Green's two ABC-Paramount LPs is definitely worthwhile. The big band date has John Carisi arrangements, including the first setting of Carisi's "Springsville."

Who was on top?

Oh, you mean - Blatherings From the Underbrow (or - Pavarotti Died & Nothing Personal, But I Really Didn't Give Too Much Of A Rat's Ass, But Then Joe Zawinul Died & It Touched Me A Little Bit)? Still looking for an editor. I don't have the balls to approach Larry... If I can find the time, I'd be delighted. Seriously. But the ball's in your court.

Here's some images of Lars Sjosten: http://www.sami.se/art/sjosten/sjosten.htm

Based on recordings I've heard on which Dylag appears, he was more fluid/fluent than this guy.

Good enough then. OK, what about ballet? Wait while I cinch up my tutu.

I for one never said that it's not. All I said was that, yeah, it's good, but I'll take a pass in favor of other things. Apparently that triggers a feeling of rejection in some. I'm reminded of Cecil Taylor's comment along the lines that "white people" can not disabuse themselves of the notion that they have some indefinable something that non-white people want. Well, this isn't exactly about that, but when I say that I've given opera a thorough general examination and have concluded that, no, there's not anything there that I particularly want, much less need. then the response is all this "oh but there's such a great history to this, it's part fo the Great Tradition, you can't understandThe History Of All The Music In All The History Of All The World" type stuff that feels to me more than a little as if I'm being told that there's something wrong with me because of my decision, or at the very least that I'm making my decision based on cultural politics and not musical objectivity, and that, c'mon, get real, who are you kidding, you know it's Great Music. Well, golly gee-whiz, guess what - I've made my decision based solely on personal, musical grounds, and no, there's nothing wrong with me. Strange as it might seem, "it's all good" doesn't mean that "it all works for me". I can, and do, appreciate -or am working on appreciating - damn near everything. But if something doesn't "work" for me after a "darn good look", including Great Music, then I feel no need to fake the love, or even the like. And somebody who's gotten metaphorical death threats about not loving, much less even liking Bill Evans ought to...have at least some part of a clue about this... Opera & metal - the two genres that, a few specifics aside - do absolutely nothing for me. Doesn't mean that they're not "good", or that they're not "significant" (or in the case of opera - Significant - no sarcasm intended), just that they don't give me anything significant and/or anything that I don't get better - for me - elsewhere. I fully recognize, accept, and even...welcome the fact that for many, many other people, an undeniably large # of people over an undeniably large period of time, that this is not the case. But I am not one of them. Sorry if that's a "problem", but if it is, it for damned sure ain't my proplem. I can't remember all of this clearly enough anymore, but some posters on this topic (but not, I think, Jim) have said or implied that there's something wrong with us if we are among those who feel that " there's a great history to this, it's part of a [not, for me, THE] Great Tradition." The "cultural politics" thing came up because it was being said over and over here ( but, again, not I think by Jim) that opera in particular was pretty much a rich white folk's snobfest. I don't believe I ever said that Jim's likes and dislikes were determined by cultural politics (because I certainly don't think so); that kind of thinking was being brought to bear here, unfairly I thought, in the other direction -- the implication being that mostly assholes liked, say, "The Marriage of Figaro," because doing so made them feel superior or something. Please, let that be the last thing I say on this!

I agree with what you're saying, but I'm sure you can at least understand that cultural politics can get in the way of one's initial appreciation of something, can't they? The sad part is that the opposite also occurs - People who appreciate what in enshrined as "fine art" but who dismiss other types of art because they're not "supposed" to like it or take it seriously. Yes, to both.

Right, but the kind of music within which/from which opera arose had its beginnings, at the very least, when I said -- around or before 1200.

Nothing -- except that sometimes it's used as an excuse (or even as something close to a demand) to stop thinking and talking.

Yeah -- and what a kind. I think that's the problem, Larry. The whole tone of that remark is wrong for me. European classical music isn't any better or more worthy of attention than R&B, Jazz, Funk, Reggae, Gospel music, Hip hop, Mbalax, Mbaqanga, Zouglou or any other kind of music. And it isn't any worse, or less worthy of attention, either. Which ones a person decides to become enthusiastic about is a matter of personal taste - and perhaps personal cultural background. So get off your high horse, young sir MG The kind of music I'm talking about, the kind that opera is one significant part of, runs in a relatively unbroken stream from, at the very least, Leonin (b. circa 1135) and Perotin (b. circa 1160) to the present. That's almost ten centuries. You can talk about fallow periods, dis that music's present and recent past if you wish, and complain about rich snotty bastards in Great Britain and elsewhere who get their Glyndebournes subsidized, but we're still left with a pretty astonishing body of work, in terms of quality, variety, and volume. Again, and of course, one likes what one likes -- "personal taste [plus] personal cultural background." But -- and I say this as someone whose entire life has been shaped by my discovery and love for jazz -- give me a call when we're into the tenth century of that music, and of R&B, Jazz, Funk, Reggae, Gospel music, Hip hop, Mbalax, Mbaqanga, Zouglou, etc. I see the smiley face, but IMO this whole discussion has been corrupted by allegations of high horse-ism. Yes, some people who love the music I mentioned up top are snotty bastards; I am not, nor are a whole lot of other people who love it. Further, if snotty-bastardism lies at the heart of that music, as you seem to come close to saying at times, how over all that time could all that music -- some of which you surely acknowledge as marvelous -- have been made in the first place? Snotty bastards tend to produce art that's hollow crap, right? Also -- and this may the main point I want to make as this jawfest, I hope, winds down -- just because you love Machaut, Mozart, and Monteverdi doesn't mean that you can't love the Swan Silverstones or Dock Boggs or James Brown. I know plenty of people who do, including people who post here all the time and don't ride high horses. Yet again -- personal taste has to prevail. I'm just saying, don't let your/our/anyone's curiosity be curtailed by cultural politics.

Yeah -- and what a kind.

One could argue that this is also the case with going to orchestra concerts in the US. Not among everyone in the audience, of course, but a significant percentage. The self-congratulatory smugness of the supposed anti-smugness here is something else. As for Jim's "I understand quite well that opera, Italian opera especially, was in its time, at root entertainment of a type not too terribly dissimilar from a Broadway musical.. People came for the show, not the 'art', and much of the medium was constructed accordingly. Well, ok, it's only rock and roll, etc..." what then do we do when the opera -- as with much Mozart, Verdi, Handel, Gluck, Monteverdi, Wagner, etc. etc. -- is brimful of art, and art of a kind and quality that can't be found or is hard to find anywhere else in music? The history of music minus the history of opera would be a fairly weird, distorted thing. Jim is of course perfectly free to step away from it himself if it doesn't work for him, for the "Don't have the time or the taste for this" reasons he gives, and so is anyone else. But I and a whole lot of people who aren't at all culture vultures feel otherwise. And we haven't even mentioned ballet!

I think that at this point in time, as the particulars of their individual immediacies inevitably fades to reveal the permanence of their intents (that is to say, all human behavior ultimately comes down to a handful of "types" of actions, although the ways they get acted out are seemingly infinite), that they are far more alike than not. Sounds interesting, but, on second thought, I don't know what you mean here. I'm not pulling your chain, but please amplify if possible. Simple. You know, the "seven (or five or how many ever) basic themes of literature" thing extrapolated to human behavior. People, individually & collectively, don't really do that many different things. They just don't. That's why there's only seven (or five or how many ever, I've got it down to one uber myself) themse to write about, because that's really all we do. The "interesting" part is in the ways we do it. Studying that shit'll have you working nights and weekends. But that 's the how. The what, that all comes down to few. And what opera, musicals, and cabaret (ususally) are is stories told with one too many layer of signification and one too many layer of I'm supposed to find this "deeper" (or something) than the stories found in real life. It;s not that it's not real, it's that it's presented to me with an implicit assumption that I'm going to like this better than reality because this is "special" or something. Like if I don't sit there and be dazzled/charmed/transported/whatever that it's my fault/problem. Opera, musicals, cabaret, are ultimately - for me - different ways of getting your ass in a chair to be convinced that what you're seeing is "magic", that the people doing it are "special", and that because I buy into their illusion, I am "sophisitcated". No matter how artfully it's done (and hell yeah, there's been enormous artfulness in all three), it's in the service of that vision (which is surely a tangent of one of the seven or five or one great themes...), and that's a vision that does not interest me at all. If I want "magic", I'll take it in, like 2-5 minute doses at a street fair and then move the hell on. And if I want real magic, hell, reality (as in unscripted real reality) has more than enough to offer, good, bad, funny, scary, and real surprise endings a fair amount of the time. And if I want MAGIC, shit, I've had a voodoo curse placed on me (for real), and how that played out has let me know in no uncertain terms that I most assuredly don't. OK, now I understand much better what you're saying, but about good parts of it, I couldn't disagree more. In particular, all or most of this: "And what opera, musicals, and cabaret (ususally) are is stories told with one too many layer of signification and one too many layer of I'm supposed to find this "deeper" (or something) than the stories found in real life. It;s not that it's not real, it's that it's presented to me with an implicit assumption that I'm going to like this better than reality because this is "special" or something. Like if I don't sit there and be dazzled/charmed/transported/whatever that it's my fault/problem. Opera, musicals, cabaret, are ultimately - for me - different ways of getting your ass in a chair to be convinced that what you're seeing is "magic", that the people doing it are "special", and that because I buy into their illusion, I am "sophisitcated". Sometimes it is that way -- "presented ... with an implicit assumption that I'm going to like this better than reality because this is 'special' or something..," especially in certain circles and/or late in the historical-social game -- but otherwise, that's a very grim way to remove all the fun and flatten all the meaning out of some stuff that never could have been created in the first place or lasted very long if it hadn't been a big source of pleasure and meaning to a lot of people who were concerned with something more than proving to themselves and to others how terrifically, righteously snotty they were. Also, as far as "'the "seven (or five or how many ever) basic themes of literature' thing extrapolated to human behavior" goes, the more literature I read, the more music I hear, etc., the more I'm convinced of the detailed specificity of the work itself unto itself, and the artist himself/herself unto himself/herself, provided it and he/she are really good. To hell with "themes," basic or otherwise; school is out. Shirley Horn is Shirley Horn, Monday M. is Monday M., Billie Holiday is Billie H., Mozart is Mozart, Monk is Monk, etc., etc.

I think that at this point in time, as the particulars of their individual immediacies inevitably fades to reveal the permanence of their intents (that is to say, all human behavior ultimately comes down to a handful of "types" of actions, although the ways they get acted out are seemingly infinite), that they are far more alike than not. Sounds interesting, but, on second thought, I don't know what you mean here. I'm not pulling your chain, but please amplify if possible.

Whoa -- When I wrote "If you're a non-fan of opera, you won't get a fair bit of where Armstrong and Bechet in particular were coming from," I was under the impression that you (and I didn't mean you in particular as much as I meant "one," as in "anyone of us") had in your life pretty much avoided the stuff on the "fat loud tenors, shrieky sopranos" principle . Since then you've explained that that's not the case at all. Fine; I understand. But I didn't feel the need in the light of that info to then formally retract what I'd first said, not realizing that we were in court of law or something. Also, my "won't get a fair bit of" point was based on my own experience; I didn't get that aspect of Armstrong and Bechet until someone pointed it out to me, played some of the pertinent records, noting resemblances, and showed me some of the texts that made it clear how much opera Armstrong and Bechet been exposed to in their youth in New Orleans.