ghost of miles

Best as always to you, Brownie--you are one of the many posters who make this forum such a worthwhile place to visit. We are all grateful for your love affair with jazz...hope you have a day as great and classy as you.

Thought New England-area posters might be interested in this. Via the Blake listserv:

Bruce, meant to add that if you're interested in SHADE OF THE RAINTREE--Larry Lockridge's bio of his dad--you can get a hardcover copy of it free via the Raintree County website. Although the bios of famous people by their children are often worthless, Larry's is very well-done--in part because he himself is a very good writer and well-versed in matters literary (he teaches at NYU and has written several other books). It got very good reviews when Viking published it in 1994, but it's now out-of-print. Even if you're not interested in the novel itself, the bio is an interesting case-study (and much more) of an ambitious mid-20th-century American literary mindset.

Thanks for reading it, Bruce. It's a sad story--RL Jr. was incredibly talented, and today I think he would have made it through his depression. What happened in late 1947/early 1948 was nearly a perfect storm of psychic/public events; it's a story that's haunted me for some years.

Christmas came early--both this and the Tristano book showed up in the mail the other day. Have only skimmed the Tristano (which looks to be wonderful), but have been intently reading the Konitz for the past couple of nights. Larry and Lazaro are right on... Konitz is very candid, and (yet?) remarkably likeable (to say nothing of his obvious intelligence). About 30 pages in and really digging the structure of the book as well (the back and forth between LK himself and fellow musicians' comments about him). Can almost guarantee that it will send you periodically to your CD shelves to pull out various Konitz titles (last night it was Paul Motian ON BROADWAY V. III for me, as well as a couple of the Verves, TRANQUILITY and VERY COOL). Love the epigraph, too: That's my way of preparation--to not be prepared. And that takes a lot of preparation!

More info about the show, plus a video clip from the late-1950s proto-black-nationalist documentary The Cry of Jazz (featuring music and appearances by members of the Arkestra), at Second Magic City: Sun Ra in Chicago. "Second Magic City" airs Saturday, Oct. 27 at 11:05 p.m. EST on WFIU and at 9 p.m. Central Time on WNIN-Evansville. It will also air Sunday evening at 10 p.m. EST on Michigan's Blue Lake Public Radio. The program will be posted for online listening Monday morning in the Night Lights archives. Next week: a live fund-drive broadcast from WFIU... WNIN and Blue Lake will carry a repeat ("Charles Tolliver on Strata East") instead.

An article I wrote for Bloom Magazine about Ross Lockridge Jr., a 33-year-old author who took his own life here in Bloomington in 1948 the same week that his debut novel Raintree County hit #1 on the national bestseller lists.

I think we've discussed Harry James' MGM chapter around here before... anyway, a heads-up on Bill Kirchner's monthly turn at "Jazz From the Archives" on WBGO:

Hope the sale helped Mosaic put some $$ in the bank...judging from this thread, surely they had some success with it.

Sometimes people's time could be better spent drinking Ripple out of a paper bag. Sometimes? (hic)

Upping this because this forum is still on shaky ground and could use a few more donations. Or a few more CD purchases. Or both. If 125 forum members kicked in $15 a year, this place would nearly pay for itself.

To my other favorite jazz-loving priest (thought of you while rereading some Merton this a.m.), have a great day--wishing you many blessings and enjoyable music experiences in the year to come. (Good luck with that Monk Riverside...and if it doesn't come through, I think just about all of it's available as single CDs.)

Good Lord, Dan... I think after that 8th inning you're looking good for another World Series trip. I'll bet there was some joyous mayhem in the Gould household while that was going on!

Lazaro: A gracious and intelligent reply. I've listened to plenty of your broadcasts online in the past two years, and you do quite well by Michigan artists. You play more avant-garde than most jazz DJs I know of around the country. Sorry, Clem, but to attack Lazaro for this one playlist is wrongheaded and borderline ridiculous. And he HAS played the people you name...I don't understand the need to go after him.

Memo to Dumpy Mama: I stand vindicated.

Thanks much, Swinger--I love doing the show, and e-mails/posts/remarks like yours are much-valued emotional coin. To answer your question, we are not allowed to post programs as MP3s... but you might want to check out this thread.

Rerunning this on WFIU this weekend, so it's already archived for online listening. WNIN will air the Portrait of Max show (also already archived) and Blue Lake Public Radio will air our autumn fund-drive program Sunday night at 10 p.m. EST--"Art Blakey: Class of '57," featuring the alto sax/trumpet front line of Jackie McLean and Bill Hardman. If you're a Blue Lake listener who enjoys tuning into the show, please pledge...they've been very supportive of the program. (Though by God it was tough last Sunday, following Lazaro's Muhal Richard Abrams show!)

By God (or collective force of Organissimo poster energy ) we should have a parade... best wishes for this one and many more, Chris!

As that immortal bard Sammy Hagar once noted, "I can't drive 55," but you sure can live it. Have a great day--good to have you around these parts.

Belated greetings and good luck with the project.

Whatever happened to spinslps?

Thanks much to both of you. I had a great talk with George this a.m. and am going to talk to him again next week. Wonderful guy.

Boy, maybe you've tapped out the crowd around here, but that's a great price, and a good cause to boot. Even if folks already have a lot of the music on the later sets (there's a great deal I didn't have, however), they are sequenced so well that any already-familiar material takes on fresh life. And even if you already have the sets themselves...Christmas is coming up soon... hmmmm.... ideal for that special jazz lover in our lives (besides ourselves, that is).

I'm interviewing George Avakian tomorrow morning--how is his last name pronounced?

Only two incidents happened to me when I was in my early 20s, living in a not-so-great part of Indy... our apartment got broken into, but all we lost was some clothes, a pair of sunglasses, and a few cassettes... we were bohemian-poor, which worked to our advantage, I guess. And I got held up at gunpoint at the restaurant where I worked. Not so much fun to have a dude in a ski-mask pointing a gun in your face and saying, "Is that all there is?" after you've given him a couple hundred out of the cash register. I'm like Jsngry--always check all of the doors and windows when I leave for the day. Pretty safe where I live, in general, but it's a college town and we always have increased break-ins when the university goes on break.